Quote of the Week...from Mark Twain

Suppose you were an idiot, and suppose you were a member of Congress, but I repeat myself.

                                                                                  ---Mark Twain

Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) lived from 1835 to 1910, so his above words...whatever year he made them...refer to the state of politics in his own time, well over a century ago.  In a way, they're reassuring, reminding us that regardless of the tomfoolery and deceit that seem to dominate Congressional politics today, this has pretty much always been the case in Washington.  On the other hand, the "idiots" in Congress, both in Twain's day and ours, tend to be reelected over and over again...so what does that make us, the general population that keeps sending them back for term after term?  Personally, I don't believe that those serving in Congress, be they in the Senate or the House of Representatives, are idiots...even the ones who at times make idiotic statements.  But they ARE perverting the intent of our founding fathers when they established this representative republic.  It all comes down to the concept of "primarying" in which a populist...even demagogic...element of a politician's own party boasts of enough fanatical voters to topple them in the next primary if they don't tow the line to their peculiar ideology.  The result is that the more extreme elements of each party tend to either control who gets their nomination, or...much more prevalently...control the behavior of those already in office, who are afraid of getting on their bad side.  Sometime in the future I plan to write an article about the "rabble", that is the masses of people in any society who tend to be more autocratic, hung up on symbols, and less educated in the civics of how our government is supposed to function.  They are easily manipulated, as recently we have seen mass hysteria about the COVID-19 pandemic...particularly in the areas of masks and vaccines, Trump worship, and widespread denial that Biden won the 2020 election fair and square.  For elected politicians to kowtow to the basest of the "base" reveals them not to be idiots, but rather as lacking in personal standards of ethics and integrity.  And I'm not giving the Democrats a free pass, either...too many of  the rank and file seem to be imbued with the notion that mass protest marches are somehow "democracy at work" while regularly skipping election after election in which there's no emotionally-gripping candidate or issue on the ballot...resulting in state legislatures across the country being dominated by Republicans, even in several "blue" states.  And what's happening nowadays with the put-downs of moderate Democrats is completely unacceptable to me...

Just Finished Reading The City by Dean Koontz

The City is a 2014 novel written by Dean Koontz, more known for horror/suspense stories dominated by deranged killers.  Although suspense abounds here as well, along with the presence of murderous villains, this book deals more with the life of its protagonist, Jonah Kirk, a 9-10 year- old black boy growing up in New York City...specifically Manhattan...during 1966-67 when protests against the Vietnam War abounded and bombs started going off. Told from the vantage point of Jonah as a 57-year-old he recounts how he discovered he had a musical talent for playing piano and picking up tunes from just hearing them...he's taken after his grandfather Teddy, a renowned player in his own right.  And Jonah's mother (his father abandoned the two) completes the family's musical bent as a talented singer.  Add to the mix Mister Yoshioka, a neighbor with sad memories of himself and his family in a World War II Japanese internment camp, Malcolm, a talented horn player about Jonah's age living across the street, and Malcom's pretty and wise older sister Amalia, and Jonah seems to have a pretty good life...except that this IS a Dean Koontz novel and you just know a lot is going to go down.  Aside from fears that Jonah's father will kidnap him, a mysterious woman Pearl, calling herself "The Spirit of the City", has warned Jonah through his dreams about a couple of vicious criminals...he inadvertently reveals his presence to them and is consequently a target, along with his family and friends.  What are the bad guys up to...at least we know Jonah will survive intact up to the present.  But do we really know that...after all, this IS a Dean Koontz novel.  I enjoyed The City as a welcome departure in tone from other books by Koontz and appreciated the author placing in relationship characters of different races and ethnicities across multiple generations, showing through many of them a vision of how people should get along with one another.  It's also a story of good vs. evil and Koontz, like his contemporary Stephen King, is a bit of a moralist with his writing...but also like King isn't overbearing about it.  And I loved all the popular music references, too. Two thumbs up from me for The City...

Weekly Short Stories: 1977 Science Fiction, Part 2

Here are two more of my reviews of science fiction short stories appearing in the anthology The 1978 Annual World's Best SF, edited by Donald A. Wollheim and featuring his picks for the best from 1977.  In that year I started attending the University of Florida here in Gainesville.  Aside from academic life and a culture of partying, the big crazes at this time were tennis and disco dancing/music.  The John Travolta movie and Bee Gees album Saturday Night Fever were the rage and my dormitory's offering of disco lessons was filled to the brim with eager residents (but not me).  Likewise, the tennis courts just across the street from my dorm room seemed to be perpetually occupied with players (but not me) noisily hitting the ball back and forth, day and night. Kind of a weird time, looking back on it now, was 1977.  And here's my feedback from a couple of that kooky year's stories...   

PARTICLE THEORY by Edward Bryant

A highly knowledgeable science writer with deep connections in that field finds himself both struck with prostate cancer as well as witness to an inexplicable chain of supernovas happening in quick succession in the night sky. His dreams do not portend well, but he manages to live his life out on both tracks, trying to save himself from his own highly personal doom while helpless to affect the larger impending disaster.  I have to admit that I didn't quite get this story, although I liked how the author talked quite a bit about subatomic physics and the cause of novas...

THE TASTE OF THE DISH AND THE SAVOR OF THE DAY by John Brunner

This story pokes fun at the gourmet culture while posing the question: What are you willing to give up in order to attain immortality? The narrator, a sci-fi writer visiting Paris for a convention of his trade, meets up with a man, called the Baron, who is attending the funeral of a distant aunt.  The Baron is one of those unapologetic gourmets and shows it out on the town.  A year later the two get together again...but the Baron refuses to touch the food or drink the great wine.  They go to his home where Gregoire, a relative of that deceased aunt and now the Baron's cook, prepares a special dish for the Baron (who quickly eats it) and narrator, who is taken by the food's extremely attractive aroma and taste.  What follows goes down that pathway regarding immortality, this time through a special concoction known only to one individual.  I liked the story for its humor and humanity...  

Next week there will be more discussion on science fiction short stories from 1977...

Game of the Week: War (Cards)

 

When I was growing up, we had our family games...one of them was a card game we called "Battle"...later on I found out that, to the world in general, it was "War".  Not a game of skill, each side is dealt out of the 52-card deck until it's spent...then they each put out a card from top of their own pile and the largest value wins all cards (Ace is high card), to be placed face up on their discard pile. The game is played until one side runs out of cards. If the two cards placed are the same, then a "war" (or battle in our version) ensues, with each player laying three of their cards face down and placing the next one face up...the highest value wins all the cards in play.  War can go on and on and on...in one game as a kid I recorded 93 battles.  Melissa and I were playing it a few days ago and it looked headed the same way...finally we agreed to play 15 more minutes and whoever had the most cards at that point won (it was Melissa, naturally).  I've read that some dude said that War wasn't really a game since it involved no decision-making on the part of the player.  But all the games I watch on TV, no matter which sport, ARE games as well with me playing no volitional role (other than to switch the channel)...I'm just playing the vicarious role of the spectator.  Still, I think the next time I pull out the card deck we'll be playing Rummy instead (which Melissa also usually wins)... 

Marking Time by Age or Calendar Year

Normally, I don't mark time by my age and birthdays...but yesterday's was a big deal because I turned 65, which seems to be a major dividing line in how my society separates people, depending on what side of that magic number they're on.  Aside from all the questions about signing up for the various Medicare plans, there has recently been a major distinction regarding vaccinations between those below or beyond the 65 year threshold.  Even before the Covid vaccine first came out several months ago, there was a special, fortified flu vaccine designed to protect the elderly...starting with those age 65 or above.  Now the booster shots for Covid are currently unavailable to the general population age 64 and below...a group to which I belonged just two days ago.  I plan to get both of these shots in the next few days, although I don't enjoy being stuck with a needle anymore than anyone else.  As for my opening comment about marking time, after I began elementary school I was primarily noting the passage of years by either my grade or the calendar year, not so much my age...although attaining 18 was significant as I was then eligible to vote.  As for the military draft, I miraculously managed to fall within the exact time period of President Nixon abolishing it and Jimmy Carter reinstituting registration...so my age didn't mean as much with that as it would were I just a few years older and concerned about being drafted for Vietnam. I now wonder whether I'm going to start thinking more of my physical age as a year marker now that I've passed the 65-year hurdle...

Great Old TV Episodes...from the Beverly Hillbillies

DUKE BECOMES A FATHER was from Season 1 of the Beverly Hillbillies CBS comedy series, first shown in April, 1963.  There are two interwoven story lines.  Mademoiselle Denise is a beautiful young French woman who is visiting Beverly Hills with her purebred dog and snobby Mrs. Drysdale thinks her own poodle is the father of the new litter...but as the episode's title reveals, it's Jed's bloodhound Duke with the honors.  Meanwhile, Mlle. Denise has entranced Jed and since she cannot speak English, he enlists the aid of Miss Hathaway to give him a lesson speaking French. It's his expectation that after one hour he will be able to completely understand his new-found love that reminded me of how so many apps and language learning courses nowadays make similar claims when becoming fluent in another tongue is much more involved and usually necessitates a degree of immersion in its home environment, surrounded by its speakers.  Jed sits and stumbles through Miss Hathaway's language lesson and, perplexed when it is almost over with very little progress made, says "Them last five minutes must be doozies!".  Granny and Jethro both shine in this episode, and Jed makes his recurring comment about his cousin Pearl's son, "One of these days I'm gonna have to have a l-o-o-n-g talk with that boy!"... 

Congrats to 100-Game Winner Tampa Bay Rays

Congratulations to the 2021 Tampa Bay Rays baseball team for not only winning the highly competitive American League East Division for the second straight year and qualifying for the postseason playoffs for the third straight, but also for amassing the very difficult milestone of winning 100 games in a season...they did this with today's 12-2 rout over the New York Yankees on the road.  The Yanks, Boston, Toronto, and Seattle are currently in an extremely tight finishing run to see which two of them will make the playoffs...looks like it will come down to tomorrow, the final day of the regular season.  Managed by Kevin Cash, this year's Rays feature strengths in every category: consistent hitting, power hitters, great fielding, and excellent pitching...both by starters and the bullpen.  And Tampa Bay has also been exceptionally well in the second half of the season in 2021 while establishing themselves as a clutch, come-from behind team in those late innings.  It's not a team of superstars, but I feel that some future greats will come from this outfit...keep your eyes open for Brandon Lowe (39 home runs, including 3 today), Randy Arozarena (team batting average leader), Austin Meadows (RBI leader), Mike 
Zunino (32 homers), Wander Franco (20-year-old rookie hitting sensation), Shane McClanahan (starting pitcher) and Andrew Kittredge (reliever).  The Rays, who made it to the World Series last year only to be bested by the Los Angeles Dodgers in six games, begin their playoff run at home this Thursday against the American League wildcard winner.  Unfortunately, since I'm returning to my afternoon/evening job this Monday, I won't be able to watch the baseball playoffs except for the weekend games...but the Tampa Bay Rays have certainly been entertaining for me thus far...  

Quote of the Week...from Bob Dylan

Take care of all your memories.  For you cannot relive them.              ---Bob Dylan

There's a corollary verse to the Bard of Our Time's above quote, this one by another noted popular lyricist: Bruce Springsteen, from his 1985 hit song: "Well, time slips away and leaves you nothing, mister, but boring stories of Glory Days".  I bring that second quote up to reinforce Dylan's conclusions: if you're stuck in your adolescent past...even to the point where you pigeonhole the same people with whom you went to school, based on decades-old relationships and refuse to recognize that we all change over the years, then you are suffering from a delusional way of thinking.  You indeed cannot relive your memories...but you can treasure them while keeping your feet planted in the present moment.  Speaking for my own experiences back then in those "non-glory days" of junior and senior high school, I felt a bit victimized during that period by many classmates and teachers around me, both groups then largely (but not exclusively) in my mind consisting of bullies, fickle "friends", and snobs.  Yet I also knew fellow students (but sadly too few teachers) who displayed genuine character and integrity and who took an active interest in others...regardless of popularity...and patiently listened to them, with the implicit belief that everyone had their own story to tell.  At the time, as possibly the most introverted individual of my era, the thought of actively seeking out peers and displaying a respectful interest in their lives and opinions never occurred to me...it was a form of behavior that eventually arose into my consciousness with maturity and is still something I'm working on after all this time.  But it does no good now reliving those old memories, since what happened to me...as well as my response to it all...belongs to my distant youth.  Still, I can draw the appropriate lessons from those experiences and apply them now...with the circle of  family, friends and acquaintances present in my ongoing life.  I graduated from high school in 1974, and no doubt a fifty-year reunion will be in the works before long.  But without discounting the value and significance of my old schoolmates and their lives, I wonder whether attending such a get-together wouldn't be beside the point...those relationships (or lack of relationship) were based on who I was and who they were, and I'm not the same person anymore and neither are they.  Only if I am allowed to play that "active listener" role around these fellow travelers in life from my distant past would going there be worthwhile, and this would involve who I am now, not as I was fifty years ago...which as I see it might be a difficult obstacle to surmount if enough folks attending there are stuck trying to relive their memories.  There's yet a third saying here to draw upon: "Let bygones be bygones"...

My September 2021 Running and Walking Report

During the month of September I was still recovering from my July 15th open-heart surgery to replace a defective heart valve and repair an aortic aneurysm. Once sternal precautions, which limited my upper body and arm movements, ended on September 9th, my physical therapist began a regimen of stretching exercises for me designed to strengthen and restore my previous range of movements.  But before that, I was encouraged to walk...in September I recorded some 60 miles covered, and the figure is probably considerably higher if you include mileage I didn't count.  I also ran some on a limited basis, recognizing that it may take a bit longer to match my pre-operation level in that activity. I've also resumed using daily my home's exercise bike as well as practicing my therapist's earlier prescribed workout for my legs and lower body. Starting next month I plan to record and report on my running mileage, longest single run, and days run as I had in previous months. But for now, I'll just report that I'm encouraged and progress is being made.  As for future races, I feel it's a little too early to look at specific upcoming events as I'm focused on listening to my body as I run and allowing myself ample opportunity to progress at a rate that is safe and lasting.  But so far things are looking good...

Weekly Short Stories: 1977 Science Fiction, Part 1

Today I begin looking at the first three science fiction short stories appearing in the anthology The 1978 Annual World's Best SF, edited by Donald A. Wollheim and publishing his picks for the best in the genre in 1977.  That year marked my first residence in Gainesville. and I'm still here 44 years later...guess I like the place.  Jimmy Carter began his presidential term with many ambitious promises but quickly got bogged down with his inability to effectively deal with the power structure in Congress despite his own party controlling both houses by wide margins.  And the New York Yankees won their first World Series in fifteen years, highlighted by Reggie Jackson hitting three home runs in the last game...I watched it sitting in the TV room on UF's Reitz Student Union first floor.  And here are my reactions to those first three tales...

IN THE HALL OF THE MARTIAN KINGS by John Varley

The first human expedition on Mars lands and sets up their living quarters. All is going well until one night it explodes, killing the only crew members able to pilot their ship back.  The disaster is caused by spiked indigenous organisms growing up from the ground and piercing the tent's walls, depressurizing it.  In spite of the tragedy and being hopelessly stranded with food, water and oxygen soon running out, the remaining crew steadfastly holds on...and makes a game-changing discovery about that Martian life form and others they notice growing around themselves...  

A TIME TO LIVE by Joe Haldeman

A circular time travel story reminiscent of the old "which came first, the chicken or the egg" question, an obscure, unpromising young man inexplicably keeps coming across lucky breaks in his life to eventually become the wealthiest and most powerful man on Earth.  After his death following an extended lifetime he is sent out into deep space to spend eternity...only that plan is interrupted when an advanced alien race intercepts his ship and revives him.  For then on, the story becomes circular and subtly hints that the random forces we see around us shaping our fates aren't necessarily as random as they may seem...

THE HOUSE OF COMPASSIONATE SHARERS by Michael Bishop

A man suffering what would normally be fatal injuries in a mining explosion on a distant planet is brought back to life with much advanced machinery, metals and material replacing a large part of his physical body...although his brain is still intact he is a cyborg in our common parlance.  He also finds himself drawn to machines and averse and repelled by humans and the messiness and smells associated with biology.  With his marriage thus threatened, his wife has him sent to a special place (the story's title) where he launches on a difficult pathway of self-discovery...and where his own destiny lies...

Next week I will continue looking at the year 1977 in the world of short science fiction...

Game of the Week: The Lottery

Whenever I think of the lottery, I think of three things: Shirley Jackson's short horror story with that title, the All in the Family episode when Edith buys what turns out to be the winning lottery ticket for her next-door neighbor Louise, and the Florida Lottery, begun in 1988 after being approved by a wide margin in the 1986 elections.  After my state's fledgling lottery instituted the Lotto with its promise of millions to the winner(s) each week, I would play along and occasionally put down a dollar for a ticket...I always used the same six numbers.  But never more than a buck at a time, nor with any real expectation of winning...it was more of a social "activity" I did with my family back then.  Not long thereafter, I lost interest and it's been many years since I ever played it.  But although the Florida Lottery has the altruistic aim of funding my state's public education system from its proceeds, it is still gambling and as such has infected many with its promises of easy money.  I don't know whether there is a gene that makes one susceptible to becoming a compulsive gambler, but sadly there was one in my family as I grew up and I quickly learned my lesson about gambling's downside.  One of the first Twilight Zone episodes I ever saw, The Fever, has a man reluctantly visiting Las Vegas with his wife.  Feeling morally superior to the "vice" of gambling he sees everywhere, he nevertheless succumbs to the temptation of the slot machine when coins pour out from it the first time he plays.  From that moment onward he is hooked...continually losing at that machine but afraid to leave it for fear that the next player would win "his" jackpot.  That's how I think a lot of habitual lottery players see their weekly ventures...the one week they skip playing just might be the week their numbers come in, and wouldn't that be tragic if they missed out.  When I'm at a convenience store or Publix at the service counter and someone in front of me in line lays down a large stash of dough on lottery tickets, part of me wants to wheel that person around and shout sense into them.  But no, it's all going for education, right?

Professor Benjamin's "Great" Math Course

A few days ago my sister Anita sent me one of the Great Courses, a series put out by The Teaching Company and featuring courses of all kinds of academic subjects.  You can check out many of them from the public library...the one I received is called The Joy of Mathematics and consists of 24 lessons on 4 DVDs along with an accompanying book duplicating each lesson.  The lecturer is Arthur T. Benjamin, a professor of mathematics at Harvey Mudd College (or at least he was in 2007 when this course came out) as well as being a renowned popularizer of this often arcane and difficult field.  I've gone through the first six lessons and have thoroughly enjoyed Dr. Benjamin's enthusiasm, sense of humor and clarity as he explains various mathematical concepts...I do a lesson a day.  Below is a list of the course's lessons, omitting the words "The Joy of" that precede each of them:

1 Math-The Big Picture

2 Numbers

3 Primes

4 Counting

5 Fibonacci Numbers

6 Algebra

7 Higher Algebra

8 Algebra Made Visual

9 "9"

10 Proofs

11 Geometry

12 Pi

13 Trigonometry

14 The Imaginary Number i

15 The Number e

16 Infinity

17 Infinite Series

18 Differential Calculus

19 Approximating with Calculus

20 Integral Calculus

21 Pascal's Triangle

22 Probability

23 Mathematical Games

24 Mathematical Magic

In the lessons I've covered so far, Dr. Benjamin has woven the discovery of patterns and their establishment by mathematical proofs through the material and has made much clearer concepts that I only fleetingly understood when taking various math courses earlier in school.  He also demonstrates some pretty nifty shortcuts...and then explains why they work. This "Great" course is definitely worth going back to, and it makes me want to check out other courses in their catalogue...

Great Old TV Episodes...from Bewitched

DRIVING IS THE ONLY WAY TO FLY was a first-season episode in the long-running comedy series Bewitched, first airing in March, 1965.  My family regularly watched this series, which at least in the first few years really clicked on a comedic level, with many great acting performances.  Darrin and Samantha Stevens (played by Dick York and Elizabeth Montgomery) are the young married couple...Samantha reveals to Darrin in the first episode that she is a witch and Darrin in turn insists that she squelch all the nose-twitching magic power that she is accustomed to using.  In this episode, since Samantha isn't supposed to fly, she insists to her hubby the need for her to learn how to drive.  Enrolling in a driving school, she gets the world's most nervous driving instructor, Harold Harold...portrayed by Paul Lynde, who would later play the hilarious role of Samantha's jokester Uncle Arthur.  Samantha's mother Endora (Agnes Moorehead), who makes no secret of her scorn for Darrin, makes a brief appearance in this one.  But some of the other funny characters are missing, like Darrin's fickle boss Larry Tate (David White) and the Stevens' nosy next-door neighbor Alice Kravitz (Alice Pearce).  But Lynde was hilarious, and I always discerned a sweet spirit that Samantha radiated throughout the series.  As a kid I always looked forward to the special episodes that featured either Lynde as Uncle Arthur or Marion Lorne as Aunt Clara, whose spells invariably backfired.  Later on, Alice Pearce died from cancer and while her character endured with another actress (Sandra Gould) it just wasn't the same.  And Dick York, whose comedic portrayal of Darrin was a classic in the history of comedy on TV, had to bow out due to back trouble, ably replaced by Dick Sargent...but it wasn't the same, either.  By the time Bewitched ended in 1972 I don't think anyone in my family was watching it anymore.  But the first few seasons...including this great episode from the first one...were special...

Tackling Still More Jigsaw Puzzles at Home

 

During my recent recovery at home I've gone through a slew of jigsaw puzzles...the nearby Walmart has an excellent selection.  I just open the box, spread the pieces out on the dining room table, and walk up to the puzzle at various random moments during the day.  I'm about to begin a new one...if you have a free surface to work on, why not try this fun activity yourself?  Besides simply being fun, it also helps the mind stay sharp, I imagine more than popping some over-the-counter pill.  Each puzzle presents its own challenges, and I enjoy tackling them while inviting anyone around to share in their construction. I've completed quite a few...the above three represent my three favorites of late.  By the way, I was surprised by a recent contestant on the game show Wheel of Fortune who said that she engaged in jigsaw puzzle competitions and that there was actually a world championship in it. If that's your schtick then go for it....for me, I like doing them for their own sake... 

Quote of the Week...from Padme Amidala in Star Wars

So this is how liberty dies...with thunderous applause.                         ---Padme Amidala

Padme Amidala, portrayed by Natalie Portman, was the love of Anakin Skywalker in the Star Wars prequel series...as well as the mother to Luke and Leia of the original trilogy.  First serving as queen of the planet Naboo and then its senator for the Republic, she makes the above comment as Supreme Chancellor Palpatine declares the reorganization of the Republic into the First Galactic Empire.  And yes, the senators present are thunderous in their approval of his decree.  But you don't need to watch a fantasy sci-fi flick to see an ominous, similar development happening in our own country.  A sitting president, after losing a close election, refuses to concede and tries to subvert the transference of power to the winner.  Failing in that, he pressures numerous state legislatures controlled by his own party (and himself) to enact laws that give these partisan bodies control over certifying election results...a rubber-stamp procedure if their own side wins but a means to use phony fraud allegations to overturn the people's will at the polls should the other prevail. In a nation with an electorate that keeps itself well-informed and can discern demagoguery, the upcoming off-year elections in 2022 should be a referendum on that former president's nefarious actions with his party suffering as a consequence.  Instead, I'm afraid that the historical pattern will hold and one party's voters will tend to sit out the elections while the other...the one this demagogue controls largely because of the unquestioning adulation of his "base"...will regain control of both the House and Senate, putting our liberty to choose our own leaders in peril by rewarding that dictator wannabe and assuring that the 2024 presidential election may well mark the end of our democracy as we know it.  And millions upon millions of Americans, themselves full of all kinds of patriotic banter and symbols...as well as kooky ideas and conspiracy theories...will be there at the forefront thunderously applauding its demise.  I hope I'm wrong in all this, but from where I see it things don't look promising...

Weather Finally Shifts Here, with Lower Humidity

Today marks a big change in our weather in north-central Florida.  For many days there has been a blanket of very high humidity here...partially caused by the remnants of  tropical storm Nicholas.  Combined with high summer temperatures, it has been stifling to walk or even just stand outside for any length of time.  But glory be, just as the official seasons changed from summer to fall, a cold front swept down through our area this morning and we are currently blessed with dry, temperate conditions.  And although the temperatures are expected once again to rise over the next few days, that blasted extreme mugginess should be gone...at least through the end of September.  Who knows, maybe I'll actually be able to go outside tonight and finally do some serious star-gazing under clear sides...

Weekly Short Stories: 1976 Science Fiction, Part 4

Today I finish looking at science fiction short stories from the year 1976 as they appeared in the book Donald A. Wollheim Presents The 1977 Annual World's Best SF, presenting the editor's choices from the previous year.  '76 marked the last full year I would listen regularly to talk radio (until 1997, that is, more about that another day), which hadn't yet been taken over and ruined by the likes of Rush Limbaugh and his imitators.  Personalities like Jean Shepherd (who wrote A Christmas Story), Barry Farber (a more traditional conservative), and Long John Nebel (a forerunner of Art Bell and George Noory's radio show dealing with off-beat topics) were on the air then, and I would listen to them for hours each week.  As for movies, the one that stands out in my memory was the TV drama Sybil, in which a struggling young woman (Sally Field) discovers through the aid of  her therapist (Joanne Woodward) that she has some fifteen different personalities.  It revived Field's acting career and introduced Brad Davis, who would star two years later in the excellent film Midnight Express.  And now, here are my reactions to those final three stories...

MY BOAT by Joanna Russ

Racial injustice and prejudice are underlying tones in this tale of a shy 15-year-old girl, Cecelia, who is the first black student in 1952 at a Long Island school.  The narrator, Jim, reminisces about his friendship with her, along with another boy, Alan, who was socially isolated in his own way.  But Cecelia has a special hidden talent to go to another world, and she's trying to decide whom to invite with her.  Reminded me a little of the Twilight Zone episode The Bewitching Pool...

HOUSTON, HOUSTON, DO YOU READ? by James Tiptree, Jr. 

An exploratory three-man crew traveling in their cramped little spaceship around the sun in our general era (late twentieth century, that is) finds itself disabled after damage from a solar flare.  But miraculously another ship is out there, ready to rescue them.  The question is, can they be trusted to be who they say they are?  The rescuers seem to be almost all women, and their ship is way beyond the men's time in technology...turns out the solar explorers had slipped into the future.  But how far, and how has humanity progressed after a terrible pandemic had decimated the population by interfering with human reproduction?  What happens to the men...and why...give a chilling lesson on human nature, both about the rescued and the rescuers...

I SEE YOU by Damon Knight

An inventor has constructed a portable "viewer" that allows the user not only to see anywhere he or she desires...in the house across the street or another planet...but also select the time of observation, from anytime in the past up to the present moment.  The implications of such a device universally in people's hands gets a vigorous examination in this tale that, to me, partially portends the advancement of microcomputer technology and the Internet, fused together in the ubiquitous smartphones of today.  Much food for thought here, especially the question of what happens when people realize that nothing they ever say and do (or said and did) is private and that everything is open to public scrutiny...

Next week I begin looking at the year 1977 in the realm of short science fiction...

Game of the Week: Croquet

A few days ago I read Agatha Christie's first mystery novel The Mysterious Affair at Styles, from 1921.  Set in a rural English estate, a passing reference is made to a croquet game...bringing to my mind a flood of memories of playing it with my family during my childhood in the 1960s.  After reading up on it, I discovered that there are different versions of croquet...including one with flamingos for mallets, hedgehogs for balls, and living card-men for wickets, if you happen to be a Lewis Carroll fan.  But here in America, we seem to have agreed on one form: the nine-wicket game.  Each player starts off in front of the "home" stake with their own mallet and colored wooden ball, the goal being to make a complete circuit of the course by putting the ball through each wicket (a thick rectangular wire stuck into the ground) in the right sequence and direction while hitting the stakes at the ends of the course before anyone else.  I remember getting pretty good at it...and then we all sadly seemed to outgrow croquet.  But I'd like to revive interest in it, at least at my home.  The only problem is that with this heavy rain we've been having and almost unbearable humidity, the ground in my backyard is thoroughly saturated with water and is sloshy to walk through.  It's bad enough to try mowing the lawn through it...at least during my recovery I'm happy to let others tackle that...but in this mushy state it is impossible to attempt a croquet game.  Still, I entertain hopes for a dryer future and plan on obtaining a croquet set soon...

Just Finished Reading First Three Nancy Drew Books

While recuperating at home from my surgery, I've had some extra time on my hands...why not go back and read an old childhood series, one I've never covered?  Nancy Drew Mystery Stories quickly came to mind, so I read the first three books, originally published in the early 1930s but revised about 30 years later, reportedly changing Nancy's age from 16 to 18 and having her less assertive and rebellious and more compliant and conforming...now always ready to help out with the dishes or housecleaning.  There were also black characters in the earlier editions that the author wrote with racial stereotypes common in that era...the revised editions "solved" that by simply eliminating the black characters!  And I've read that in some revised editions, the plot was so drastically changed that there was little resemblance to the originals.  Still, I thought I'd cross over the gender stereotypes and be a guy reading supposedly "girl" books...heck, I read all of my sister's Trixie Beldon and Donna Parker books when I was a kid.  By the way the listed author of the Nancy Drew books is Carolyn Keene, but they were really written by an assortment of writers over the years, starting with Edward Stratemeyer and his kin...  

In the first book, The Secret of the Old Clock, a wealthy, recently-deceased benefactor apparently has left his considerable fortune all to one snooty and undeserving family while several different people Nancy befriends claim that he had promised them a share of his inheritance.  Now the search is on for the second will that, hopefully, will set things straight.  Unfortunately, the book's title as well as the cover picture tend to give away the story...  

The second book, The Hidden Staircase, has Nancy investigating a supposedly haunted house that an unscrupulous real estate speculator is inexplicably trying to buy up...Nancy's friend Helen enlists her help as her aunt and great-grandmother live there and are understandably unsettled by the frights.  The disappearance of her father, apparently kidnapped, adds urgency to her efforts to find him and solve the mystery.  Guess what? The solution involves a hidden staircase...who would have imagined...

In the third book, The Bungalow Mystery, Nancy and her friend Helen find themselves in dire peril after a raging storm sinks their boat in the middle of a lake...only to be rescued by Laura, an orphaned teenager.  Her mother only died recently and had arranged for a nearby couple to be her guardians...but when they arrive they only seem interested in locking Laura in her room and trying to take from her the valuable jewelry her mother left behind.  Meanwhile, Nancy's lawyer father Carson has enlisted her help in an embezzlement probe...I pretty much had this one figured out early on...

As you would expect children's novels to be, Nancy Drew is written in short, simple sentences with plain language...ah, how refreshing after reading so much "adult" writing that seems to be deliberately designed to be difficult to understand.  Still, I think I'll leave Nancy for a while and tackle one of those "big boy" books...

Great Old TV Episodes...from The Man from U.N.C.L.E.

THE MAD, MAD TEA PARTY AFFAIR was first aired in February, 1965...by that time (I was eight) its series, The Man from U.N.C.L.E., had easily become my favorite TV show, with me writing down the names of each episode as I saw them and enjoying the whole secret agent ambience of it...which clearly in retrospect was a takeoff on the successful James Bond movie series.  This particular episode takes place almost entirely within U.N.C.L.E. (United Network Command for Law and Enforcement) in a high-rise building, presumably New York City.  Protagonist agents Napoleon Solo (played by Robert Vaughn) and Illya Kuryakin (David McCallum) find themselves at headquarters confronted with two challenging problems: an eccentric elderly man has infiltrated the supposedly secure building while THRUSH, the criminal enemy organization of U.N.C.L.E.,  has sent someone to plant a bomb there to kill those attending a crucial meeting.  But what makes this episode so memorable to me happened before it was ever aired: at the conclusion of each episode they would show short previews for the following week's show...for this one they showed an airplane headed straight at a skyscraper building, from the viewpoint of the building itself!  That image always stuck in my mind and quickly came to the forefront when 9/11 happened more than 36 years later.  No, it wasn't a passenger jet...just a model plane launched from a nearby park by that earlier-mentioned gentleman: but he did make the creepy comment that it was on a suicide mission.  Although that episode had some serious suspense and stakes as to its outcome, it also had many moments of lightheartedness...and I recommend it to this day if they ever get around to showing this very entertaining old series on television again...

Gainesville Attorneys Vie for Title of Biggest UF Gator Fan

As I sit here watching the University of Florida football team behind Alabama late in their game...although performing much better than I had expected...I wondered how some competing Gainesville attorneys have been spending their time for the last three hours.  One firm's ad has its senior lawyer sitting with his son, the junior partner, in an empty Ben Hill Griffin Stadium (UF's home field) looking up to the sky like visionaries to show how devoted they are to their Gator idols.  Then there's the commercial featuring another local lawyer who indirectly puts down the first firm and claims that HE was the true Gator...not only was he a Florida grad but also played on their football team, by golly!  And the other evening I saw yet a third firm claiming that THEY bleed Orange and Blue.  Presumably, potential clients of these attorneys will see how attached these dudes are to the University and as a result will rush to employ their services.  As for me, they might as well have come out with their favorite color or rock band, for all the meaning that conveys.  If I need to seek legal counsel, I'm going to want to know facts about their competence, integrity, and track record of attaining successful judgments...not irrelevant tripe like this.  And what if I have a beef with the University of Florida...the last person I would want to represent me in court is someone who has professional and/or deeply emotional ties to that school. So you're a football jock from your youth and want to use that to hawk your trade...that approach makes ME more likely to reject you, not run to you.  I feel the same about other ex-jocks, Gators or not, who trade on their athletic pasts to promote their respective business ventures or endorsements.  As for the Gainesville attorneys, I wonder whether any more will join the contest for Biggest Gator Fan...

Quote of the Week...from Robert Benchley

Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he is supposed to be doing at the moment.

                                                                                 ---Robert Benchley

Robert Benchley (1889-1945) was an American humorist, writer and actor...when I randomly accessed the above quote of his I at first mistook him for Peter Benchley, who wrote Jaws.  There's something indeed funny about this quote, but that doesn't make it any less real or profound. It struck me that here was a statement that pretty much summed up my academic career during my youth, from elementary school through college.  I'd have homework to do each night, but would I do it? Why no, there's this cool book to read instead or astronomy or history or foreign languages or something else...anything but what I was assigned.  And how many of us put off our more mundane and physically-engaging duties in our personal lives while going to the gym or similarly involving ourselves faithfully in exercise routines?  I learned a lot during my school days...it just wasn't what the teachers expected from me according to their own curricula and calendars.  There was an old SpongeBob SquarePants episode titled Procrastination, in which our absorbent hero is assigned a paper by his driving instructor about what you can do at a traffic light.  He cleans his home spotless, overfeeds his pet snail...and does just about everything other than actually write his paper.  And yes, it was all very funny...but sad as well, for it reminded me of my own tendency at times to put necessary things off in the guise of "working" on others...

Constellation of the Month: Capricornus

 

Capricornus is considered a September constellation in that it crosses the meridian in mid-evening, and it's along the Zodiac between Sagittarius and Aquarius.  But you need a location away from city lights to be able to really see it well...its brightest star is only magnitude three and no others are brighter than magnitude four.  Dubbed the "Sea Goat" (whatever that's supposed to be), its shape is like a boat or basket...making it relatively easy to spot in appropriately dark skies.  I misspelled Delta Capricorni's Arabic name Deneb Algedi in the above picture: it's that brightest star I was referring to, on the far eastern (left) end.  On the opposite part of the sky is the constellation Cancer: yes, these two are directly related to Earth's "Tropic of" latitudes that at a time in the past represented the northernmost and southernmost points in the sky where the sun would lie...and on Earth where it would reach the zenith at noon...on the summer and winter solstices.  The constellations fulfilling this function nowadays are Sagittarius and Gemini.  I didn't put the different stars' Greek alphabet designations in the above picture because I prefer their proper names, usually derived from Arabic.  Now that I've written about Capricornus I feel duty-bound to go outside in the evening and try to see it...shouldn't be too hard if the weather cooperates. After Cygnus (which I wrote about in September 2020) there just aren't that many standout constellations for this month...next year should be a challenge to find a third...

Weekly Short Stories: 1976 Science Fiction, Part 3

Today I continue to examine 1976 science fiction short stories as they appeared in the following year's anthology Donald A. Wollheim Presents The 1977 Annual World's Best SF.  In 1976 there was a lot of good music: I especially liked the albums Year of the Cat by Al Stewart and A New World Record by Electric Light Orchestra...the latter contained my "song of the year" in Livin' Thing.  Other favorite songs included Billy Joel's Angry Young Man, Judy Collin's Send in the Clowns and John Miles' Music.  Below are my reviews of two more stories from that year, starting with one with which many are already familiar because of its later film adaptation...

THE BICENTENNIAL MAN by Isaac Asimov

In Asimov's fictional future universe robots play a big part, subject to his Three Laws of Robotics as well as receiving fear and resentment from much of the human population.  One robot, named Andrew Martin, has a desire to achieve "freedom" from being owned property. He achieves this but finds obstacles to acceptance everywhere he turns.  Finally he concludes that only by becoming human himself will he be accepted and the story flows from there. It's clearly an analogy to the American civil rights movement, the abolishment of discriminatory laws, and the slow transformation of attitudes about race.  Isaac Asimov reportedly wrote this story as part of a doomed effort from someone else to compile an anthology of sci-fi tales relating to the ongoing Bicentennial theme...he was the only writer to come through with one, and it became famous...

THE CABINET OF OLIVER NAYLOR by Barrington J. Bayley

Wow, this packed tale has a lot to discuss: Britain chooses to be economically isolated from the world in the 21st century and the resulting many innovations there include a device that totally eliminates speed-of-light barriers to space travel...fast-forward a few years and we have a tinkerer/inventor in his own craft, traveling at a velocity of hundreds of powers of light speed.  His aim is philosophical speculation about the nature of identity, spurred on by his invention of a device that creates alternative universes whose characters are trapped in endless loops...he likes the isolation of deep-space travel for his musings.  But he has a distraction: a hitchhiker who wants to reach another individual whose ship is located many universes away (yes I said that) on the edge of a matterless lake: what's that, you ask...only something very, very scary!  How the mission pans out shows the petty, deeply-flawed and stagnant nature of people amid the most incredible technological advances ever conceived: kind of reminded me about where we are today...

Next week I conclude my look at 1976 short science fiction...

Game of the Week: KenKen

 

I'm a fan of number logic puzzle games, and that includes Sudoku, Kakuro, and Hidato.  Another one that is rising in popularity is KenKen, invented in 2003 by Tetsuya Miyamoto and embraced and published by Will Shortz and the New York Times in a series of books...the above one I bought recently at Books-a-Million.  It bears a limited similarity with Sudoku in that each puzzle's grid of rows and columns will be filled with unique integers going from 1 to whatever the dimension size is...hence a 4X4 puzzle will contain numbers from 1 to 4 and one with  a 6X6 grid goes from 1 to 6.  That said, KenKen greatly differs from Sudoku in that one must employ the indicated operation with the marked-off spaces to fill in the numbers.  So looking above again, "1-" means the two numbers differ by one, "12x" means the numbers multiplied together equal 12, "2÷" means that one number divided by the other equals 2, and "9+" means that the sum of the blocked off numbers in the row or column equals 9.  Like Sudoku and Kakuro, I tend to write in the blank squares the possible numbers in tiny form, and then write the solution over them when I discover it.  Also, like just about any puzzle KenKen varies in difficulty from puzzle to puzzle...in the book I'm working on now they start at "Easy" and progress to "Medium" and then "Challenging".  Miyamoto is a math teacher and reportedly invented KenKen as a way to train his students to combine logic and the four basic arithmetical operations.  For me it's a fun variation from the other paper number logic puzzles out there, and I tend to tear pages out of the book to work on whenever convenient... 

My Take on the Recent U.S. Open Tennis Tournament

The U.S. Open major tennis tournament has just ended...it began on August 30th.  Being at home in my current situation with a lot of time to watch TV, I picked up on it in the first round of the men's and women's singles divisions...each of which had 128 entrants to play for the title over seven successive rounds.  Naturally, ESPN, which carried the tournament, couldn't show all the early matches but I still saw enough to get to know some of the principals.  Novak Djokovic was aiming for a calendar year Grand Slam, not accomplished on the men's side since Rod Laver...in attendance for the finale...won the four majors in 1969.  Aiding him in his quest this year, after winning the first three majors, was the absence of 2020 Open champion Dominic Thiem..as well as superstars Rafael Nadal and Roger Federer...all from injuries.  Still, there was stiff competition from others, including Daniil Medvedev, whom Djokovic had defeated in the Australian Open finale at the beginning of the year.  Djokovic seemed to struggle early on in each round I saw, but wore his opponent down in the later sets.  As for his final adversary, Medvedev, I did see him play until he faced Djokovic, and in that match he was nearly perfect with his placements, serves, and strategy while the Grand Slam aspirant seemed flat much of the time. Medvedev won the title in three straight sets and was clearly the better player that day.  On the women's side I remember seeing 18-year-old Emma Raducanu play very well in some early matches but didn't think she would last all the way to the final match, which she won in straight sets over 19-year-old Leylah Fernandez, another player seeming to come out of nowhere to upset higher-ranked players, including defending Open champion Naomi Osaka,  Angelique Kerber, Evita Svitolina, and Aryna Sabalenka.  It was fun getting to know the different players with their idiosyncrasies, but I was often annoyed at the heckling from some in the spectator stand against players they disliked.  For most of the earlier matches the crowd was clearly vocal against Djokovic but turned in his favor when the end drew near...pretty fickle of them if you ask me.  I also enjoyed the TV commentators, including Chrissie Evert and John McEnroe.  What made this tournament more meaningful than others I've seen is that I was able to watch the weekday afternoon and evening matches, something that normally would conflict with my work schedule.  It was a bit scary the night that the remnant of Ida struck New York City (Queens), the site of the tournament: not only did the intense rain interfere with the matches by rendering some of the courts useless, but many fans, upon leaving the stadium, found themselves in the middle of a driving flood with water up to their knees or even higher.  I'm looking forward to seeing the Williams sisters, Nadal, and Federer return to the court, although it looks as if the younger players are rising up to take over.  By the way, it's no accident that I didn't refer to the different players' affiliated countries: I'm sick of the crass nationalism on the part of some that gets in the way of appreciating and respecting the players' individual talent, fortitude and discipline that got them there in the first place...

Enjoying Outdoors Starbucks after Hiatus

 

For the first time since my operation in July, I am sitting at my favorite Starbucks here in northern Gainesville...the big change from before is obvious: no indoor seating due to the COVID resurgence that took place while I was gone.  But there are plenty of outdoor seats, and I'm enjoying my decaf caffè americano.  In the decades preceding my surgery...specifically the years from 1978 to July 13, 2021...I was a heavy consumer of caffeine, chiefly through coffee.  Since then, though, I have thoroughly avoided this socially-acceptable mind-and-body-altering drug, for two reasons.  One is that I've become strongly opposed to being dependent on any chemicals to alter my mental state...the other is that the interruption from caffeine with my two-week hospital stay and subsequent home recovery has enabled me to tear away from my dependence on it.  And I intend to stay that way while continuing to avail myself of Starbucks, Dunkin' Donuts...and of course, my home coffee maker.  Sadly, it looks like at least at this Starbucks store, decaffeinated iced coffee is unavailable, but caffè americano is one of my favorites there and comes in decaf mode.  It's nice to just sit here and take in the ambiance...I didn't realize how much I had missed it!  There are about three weeks until my "official" recovery ends and I return to work...but I know that I still have more time ahead of me before I am completely back to "normal".  Yet in some ways I am already fitter than before, with much better eating habits and a corresponding weight loss...no longer overweight despite having been a runner.  Good stuff...

About 9/11 and Our Country, Then and Now

Twenty years after the horrendous terror attack on our country on September 11, 2001 there are numerous ceremonies nationwide...and in particular on those sites of the villainous acts...honoring and remembering those who lost their lives.  America is unified in this, and the 3000 lives snuffed out on that day, along with the heroism of many who made that final sacrifice, should never be forgotten.  Arab extremist terrorists from Al-Qaeda plotted and carried out their scheme, which involved hijacking and piloting four passenger jets and flying them into the World Trade Center buildings, the Pentagon, and either the Capitol or White House...the last foiled when passengers and crew revolted and that plane crashed into a Pennsylvania field.  It's a shame that my country today is so divided about a different...but much deadlier...attack: that of a little virus, COVID-19, that so far in the past year and a half here has claimed nearly 660,000 lives.  Yet millions of people, many of whom were rightfully outraged at the 9/11 carnage and who expressed the willingness for our government...however intrusively...to drastically enhance its surveillance and security measures to protect us from future attacks, are hopelessly lost in a tangle of misinformation about the usefulness of masks and vaccines to save lives and curtail the pandemic.  I get it: comparing death figures can get a bit impersonal, and every one of those who perished on 9/11 should be treasured...especially those first responders who never hesitated to put themselves in harm's way to save others then.  But today's 660,000 number of COVID deaths (which is steadily climbing) is 220 times the fatalities from twenty years ago, yet these people all around me are sickly obsessed with losing their "liberty" from just wearing a flimsy little cloth mask to protect others around them from their exhaled germs, a common measure taken during epidemics that predates today by much longer than twenty years.  When the COVID vaccines came out a few months ago I thought good, now these bizarre anti-maskers can get inoculated and won't be such a threat to me, my family, friends, and society at-large.  But no, too many of them had to get themselves all hung up over the vaccine and refuse it as well...the resulting overcrowded hospitals with COVID patients, most of them by far unvaccinated, and the universal upsurge of the much more virulent Delta variant has prevented others with different life-threatening conditions from receiving their needed treatment. I myself came within days of having my own scheduled open heart surgery cancelled a few weeks ago, just because so many refused their civic duty to mask up and get vaccinated, easy and convenient measures that pose no danger to them.  I contrast this with the brave, sacrificial behavior of those 9/11 firefighters and others who laid down their own lives to save others and I cringe at the disparity between then and now...and it makes me much more apprehensive about our future than it ever did on that fateful day in September, 2001...

Quote of the Week...from Morris West

If you spend your whole life waiting for the storm, you'll never enjoy the sunshine.

                                                                            ---Morris West

Morris West (1916-99) was an Australian writer who put out a number of popular and critically-acclaimed novels, usually focusing on politics and religion.  Not that you need to be such a writer yourself or even interested in his areas of concern to understand and embrace his above quote.  As humans with functional brains, we will fill the conscious hours we have with thoughts of one kind or another...and to an extent we can control where to direct those thoughts.  Some people I know...as well as the previous president...spend an enormous percentage of their existence thinking about themselves: these are commonly called "narcissists".  Others are in the habit of repeatedly playing tapes in their minds about past offenses, losses or failures...or obsess on their old "glory days" that have long passed by.  Still others are present-focused, but train their thoughts on specific goals and actions in front of them...we all do that to an extent and need to as responsible adults.  And some people spend their time worrying about the future beyond the things they can personally control...what a waste of the precious and transitory gift of life!  There is a concept floating around called "mindfulness" that can, like with anything else, get muddled down with rules. But as I see it, its essence is for us at times to interrupt our habitual thought trains...including that pointless worry...with simply stopping, looking around, and appreciating what we have now in front of us.  When I was a youngster, I would go with my sister and parents to the local grocery store.  As we would  make our way up and down each aisle, I remember noticing the different decorations and pictures on the wall.  I could do this because my mind did not have the burdens of responsibility that my parents did, as they were focused on the items on their list...among whatever tapes they had going on in their own minds at the time.  Nowadays, I couldn't begin to describe my own favorite grocery store that I have been going to for decades...other than its functional layout of goods, registers, departments, and restrooms which corresponded solely to my purposeful actions.  I'm not saying that we shouldn't be responsible adults and just let everything slide in favor of aimless contemplation, but a little of the latter mixed into our lives can go far to interrupt the destructive mental habits we often engage in. Going out on walks and jogs often provides me with the chance to get out of myself and observe and appreciate the world around me.  And turning off the TV with its doomsday news channels and simply sitting in a chair on the back or front porch carries similar benefits...      

Just Finished Reading The Mysterious Affair at Styles by Agatha Christie

The Mysterious Affair at Styles, which I just finished reading, was Agatha Christie's very first novel, published in 1921 and introducing her trademark sleuth, Belgian detective Hercule Poirot.  Set during World War I, here we see Poirot as a recently-arrived refugee from his home country.  Arthur Hastings, on leave at a rural estate from the war, finds himself in the middle of turmoil surrounding the highly suspicious death there of the owner, the wealthy widow of the original landholder.  It appears to be a poisoning, and Hastings witnesses some peculiarities about the behavior of the various residents and visitors on that fateful morning: the deceased's profligate second husband, her two stepsons, the oldest stepson's wife, a young woman residing there who works at a nearby hospital, the widow's personal friend...and a problematic physician who just so happens to be a renowned expert on poisons.  Hastings runs into his old friend Poirot and asks him to look into the case, which has attracted the attention of Scotland Yard.  What ensues is a procession of suspects, revealed clues, Poirot's enigmatic ideas and behavior, puzzling actions and speech among the principals...and a surprise ending: of course the Belgian detective had pretty much figured it all out early on.  Hastings serves as a Dr. Watson-like character who reacts to each new development as most people would, repeatedly setting himself up for correction by Poirot.  For someone's very first novel I thought The Mysterious Affair at Styles was brilliant...I'm thinking of going through the entire Poirot series of Christie novels...I've already read the second book, titled Murder on the Links,  as well as The Mystery of the Blue Train, Murder on the Orient Express, Death in the Clouds, and Sad Cypress: click on the titles to read my reviews...  

Weekly Short Stories: 1976 Science Fiction, Part 2

Below I discuss two more 1976 science fiction short stories from the anthology Donald A. Wollheim Presents The 1977 Annual World's Best SF, covering the editor's picks for the previous year.  I found today's selections special and appealing...I wish more of the listed stories were like them.  As far as 1976 was concerned personally, I ran my last running race in it (with dubious results) until 2008, and I became attached to studying foreign languages, including Chinese and Russian which I continue to pursue to this day...it was fun learning the Russian Cyrillic writing system that year.  In sports the Miami Dolphins had one of their two losing seasons (barely) during Don Shula's 35-year reign as their head coach...oh, to return to a semblance of that consistency of quality.  And the Yankees finally returned to the World Series after more than a decade's absence, only to be swept by the Cincinnati Reds.  Here are my reactions to those stories...

THE HERTFORD MANUSCRIPT by Richard Cowper

I loved the 1960 film adaptation of H.G. Wells' novel The Time Machine, starring Rod Taylor and Yvette Mimieux.  Cowper's story is a sequel to this classic and picks up where Wells' story ended: the time traveler, frustrated at the war-mongering world of his time and unbelieving friends, gets in his machine and disappears forever.  But where when did he go? In this story the author lays out an intriguing answer, as well as a lesson for us all in this time of pandemic when the masses resort to superstition, unfounded theories and scapegoating instead of following rational, science-based responses.  Very memorable tale, although I did feel a little discomfort at a different author adding to the work of a previous one...

NATURAL ADVANTAGE by Lester Del Rey

An intelligent spaceship of non-humans are dismayed on their long voyage to study an cloud of deadly anti-matter as it approaches a star with a planetary system when they discover intelligent life on the clouded third planet, indicated by the emitted radio signals.  When they finally meet up in space with a human delegation from Earth, they are dismayed with the humans' scientific and linguistic backwardness as well as doubting their capacity to develop the needed technology fast enough to avoid the impending cataclysm in time, only ten years ahead.  But humanity delivers a stunning surprise at the end to the frustrated would-be rescuers, highlighted by one of the greatest final lines I have ever read in any work of fiction...

Next week: more about sci-fi short stories from 1976...

Happy Anniversary, My Dear Melissa

Today I'd like to say HAPPY ANNIVERSARY to most definitely my "better half", my sweet wife of 35 years.  Melissa, with each succeeding year I only grow more in love with you...and the health trials I've experienced this summer have only brought us closer together.  Baby, you're the greatest!

Just Saying...From a January 1970 Newspaper Report

 

TRYING TO PREVENT INFLUENZA is the title to a caption appearing in the January 1st, 1970 edition of the Hollywood Sun-Tattler, distributed by United Press International.  The picture displays four London, England office workers at their typewriter stations, all wearing masks to prevent the spread of influenza during a serious epidemic at that time.  I've yet to come across any reports of mass uprisings of indignant citizens opposing masks in the name of their "liberty": I'll let you know if I do, but I doubt it...folks back then understood their RESPONSIBILITY to each other in the midst of a public health crisis. No, I don't know whether there were mask mandates imposed then, but maybe they didn't need to be if the populace had enough common sense to wear them in the first place...

Here is the text of the caption: "TRYING TO PREVENT INFLUENZA--London office workers wear masks in an effort to evade the current influenza epidemic that hit Britain and most of Europe.  Emergency influenza cases in London rose to their highest level in seven years.  Volunteer nurses stepped in to fill gaps in hospital staffs throughout the country as the number of cases climbed and doctors and nurses were among victims of the outbreak.".

Great Old TV Episodes...from The Twilight Zone

 

THE MIND AND THE MATTER, a second-season Twilight Zone episode that first aired in May of 1961 (I was four at the time and most definitely sound asleep that evening), stars legendary comedian Shelley Berman playing cranky, harassed office worker Archibald Beechcroft, who lives in the big city (presumably New York) and endures the daily oppression of...as he puts it..."people, people, people" crowding and jostling him about everywhere: the subway, elevators, cafeteria, office.  Finally reaching his work desk one morning, Beechcroft is greeted by his ever-ebullient young co-worker, who then proceeds to spill coffee all over him.  Later, at lunch in that crowded cafeteria, he gets his foiled meal from a vending machine and is hailed to a table with this same individual...who spills his drink all over him again, naturally.  But he has a book for him, titled The Mind and the Matter, and claims that a friend was able to mentally influence a store's customer into buying a specific piece of clothing after reading it.  "Chapter Three", he stresses to Beechcroft, and our stressed-out hero reluctantly accepts it.  Later, he gets deep into the book (see above) and tries its claim that mental concentration can change the world.  After successfully making his annoying landlady disappear, the next morning he completely empties the subway and his office of people.  Eventually becoming bored at that, he decides to make the world full of exact duplicates of himself, his cynical and complaining personality included.  When he gets a big dose of what he's really like, Beechcroft repents and, resigned, returns the world to its original state, after which his colleague comes into the office and spills more coffee on him...

Aside from the fact that to an extent I felt a certain kinship and sympathy to Archibald Beechcroft's antipathy about crowds, I thought his final decision to just give up and try to adapt to the world as it really is was a bit shortsighted.  When one learns to do something the first day, they don't take that limited time span and evaluate their effectiveness and then just quit if the early outcome doesn't measure up to expectations.  Instead they evaluate what went right and what went wrong, and adjust accordingly.  Had Archibald Beechcroft really been able to create his own universe simply by concentrating hard, he could have made it simply a bit less crowded and populated by those folks who, from his own experiences with them, he liked and respected.  But then again, the show's writers might have been making the point that he was a bit of a shallow thinker, anyway.  The Mind and the Matter was one of a handful of Twilight Zone episodes specifically designed to be funny and light-hearted.  Others that come to mind starred Carol Burnett, Orson Bean and Buster Keaton... 

Just Finished Reading A Runner's High by Dean Karnazes

A Runner's High, out just this past April, is the second Dean Karnazes book I've read among his several over the last fifteen years.  Back around 2010 I read (and reread) his excellent debut book on running titled Ultramarathon Man.  Karnazes has been an avid ultra-distance runner...not at the top of his sport in terms of finishing times but with a long, impressive record of very long runs.  But for me, never interested in running longer distances than marathons, his perspective on the sport...or maybe better to call it a lifestyle...resonated deeply with me enough back than to buy it on my Kindle.  "Karno", as he is often called by his buddies, has a very compelling and personal writing style.  He doesn't treat distance running by itself, but rather integrates it with his own personal life story and relationships.  There's a kind of duality here: on one hand, for him running is supremely a solitary endeavor befitting his own introverted nature...on the other his recollections are full of meaningful and sometimes life-changing interactions with others.  His first book delves into his childhood and earlier running years, while A Runner's High is more about recent years and how aging (Karnazes is now 59) has forced him into a reassessment of this activity, emphasizing now the experience more than ever over his previous competitive nature and goals.  He revisits the Western States 100, an exclusive race in mountainous California (limit: 369 entrants drawn by lottery), his initial experience running it recounted in Ultramarathon Man.  Coming back after some intervening years, he realizes, once upon the trail, that he is no longer in shape to finish it and has to struggle...along with some "tough" love from his son Nicholas and his parents and wife...to get back into the race after he had decided to drop out.  And family is a very big deal in A Runner's High.  I haven't read Dean Karnazes' other books on running and don't know how personal his writing is in them, but I enjoyed in the two books I've read so far in how he describes his philosophy of running and his experiences...not so much all the relational stuff.  One other thing about Karnazes and his running: a few years ago, an acquaintance of mine who was (and I believe still is) involved in marathon running would make a big deal about how during a race he never stopped running to walk as others do, many by deliberate design...as if this somehow made his own performance more legitimate.  Well, in the much longer races Karnazes engaged in, NOBODY ever ran the entire distance.  There would be aid stations interspersed along the route and racers would be required at times to stop and undergo inspections from a stationed medical authority to determine their fitness to continue.  There would be seats to sit in and rest...for as long as they wanted...and food and refreshments, as well as opportunities to change shoes and socks.  The runners usually had friends and/or family at some of these outposts ready to aid them during their breaks.  And during many of these events, the terrain at different times was either so steep-ascending, steep-descending, too rocky or muddy or involved crossing water...that running through these stages would be impossible and walking, climbing, and sometimes even crawling were the necessary actions...I don't think that dude would be sticking to his conceit very long about "running the whole race" were he to try out one of these longer ones.  As I mentioned earlier, I have no plans to run any ultramarathon races, although they've become much more widespread in recent years and quite a few are held each year in my state of Florida.  No, half-marathons are pretty much my upper limit now in distance.  And I have every intention of continuing to run them long after I turn 65 next month...

Quote of the Week...from Vincent van Gogh

What would life be if we had no courage to attempt anything?                ---Vincent van Gogh

The other evening I was sitting there with the TV on Soundscapes, a Music Choice channel I like that's part of my cable service.  One of its cool features is an on-screen procession of inspiring quotes by famous people...the above one by the renowned nineteenth century Dutch artist stood out to me.  For he was right: trying new things can demand a great amount of courage, especially since failure is often a prominent part of that.  Change is growth...not changing is stagnation, withering, decay and death.  It's important to have a strong proactive element in my mental/emotional makeup that suggests, permits...and sometimes ultimately drives me to venture into fresh waters of new goals and endeavors.  Also, it helps from time to time to undergo an interruption...planned or not...in my daily routine of habits.  This gives me the opportunity to live away from some of the bad habits I've developed and point my life in a more healthful and productive direction...my recent surgery and recovery has served as such an interruption and has focused me on a number of areas that I am changing for the better.  And recovery from open heart surgery...not to mention making the decision to undergo it in the first place...definitely fits into the category of things attempted needing courage.  I am not well-versed in art...although I'm very familiar with van Gogh's beautiful, eerie  1889 painting The Starry Night, to which Don McLean paid tribute in his touching, sensitive 1972 song Vincent.  I do know that this great artist lived his life true to his own standards, bravely explored new frontiers in his craft...and suffered through debilitating mental illness while being unrecognized for his accomplishments until after his much too early death at age 37.  He's known for a lot of excellent quotes, but this one struck me personally in this season of my life...

Recently Saw the Movie Dances with Wolves

This past weekend Melissa and I decided to watch a movie at home together.  Being Netflix subscribers, we browsed through what was available and I noticed the 1990 movie Dances with Wolves.  Neither of us had seen it, and I knew it was critically acclaimed and won multiple Oscars, including Best Picture.  So in spite of the fact that it was listed as lasting for more than 3 hours, we settled down to watch it.  Kevin Costner starred in it, directing, co-producing and portraying the protagonist.  Adapted from the same-titled book by Michael Blake, Costner's character was that of Lt. John Dunbar of the United States (Union) Army, whose introductory scene in the Civil War has him lying in a medical tent with his injured foot about to be sawed off.  Somehow he manages to painfully put his boots back on and sneak away, but he realizes that he's liable to suffer a slow death from infection and decides impulsively at the start of a battle with entrenched Confederate soldiers to take a horse and ride to his death in front of their lines.  But miraculously none of the enemy soldiers' bullets find him, and his action spurs his own side to boldly attack, winning the confrontation and resulting in Dunbar getting the best medical treatment for his foot, a promotion in rank, decorations, and the choice of where his next assignment will be. Finished with the war, he chooses the westernmost outpost, deep in the northern Great Plains.  Eventually he is further assigned to a remote post in the middle of nowhere and which has been abandoned.  From here he faithfully performs his duties in solitude until he discovers he is not alone...there are Indians nearby, camped by the creek with many horses and tents.  And from here the story takes off about how this one soldier first confronts, then befriends...and finally joins the Sioux people, complete with buffalo hunts and a battle against their enemy, the Pawnee.  He also finds love among his adoptive people.  But Dunbar knows that the whites will be coming in great numbers here, led by his own Army...and the meeting of the two cultures can only go one way.  The movie's ending as expected is very climactic and I felt that both Blake the author and Costner the director and actor did a great job spinning a very compelling tale...no wonder it garnered those awards.  Still, I have some issues about it to discuss...

I remember, when Dances with Wolves first came out, from its description that it sounded an awful lot like the 1970 Dustin Hoffman film Little Big Man.  In fact, while the later story essentially was independent and stood well on its own, I kept noticing elements of the first movie that were incorporated into it...there seems to have been a lot of derivation going on.  Even the Pawnee Indians were depicted as thoroughly murderous and depraved in both movies.  Which brought me to another problem:  the Pawnee were shown to be collectively and individually bad while the Sioux were just wonderful in every way.  The white Union soldiers, when they finally arrived on the scene (except for Costner's character, of character), were dominated by cruelty, petty greed, fear, and bigotry.  Were these three groups really this distinctly categorizable?  I think not...I tend to believe, and you're free to disagree with me, that within different ethnicities of people there are both the good and the bad, and yes, sometimes the net effect of those different groups meeting one another will result in one becoming dominant, sadly at times even to the point of genocide.  But if I were a descendant of the Pawnee nation I'd really feel like my ancestors were getting a unfair, bad rap from these movies.  Nevertheless, I thought Dances with Wolves was great and Costner deserved all the accolades he received for it.  Still, it was a little difficult sitting through three hours of it...we decided halfway through to take a break and walk around the block...

Weekly Short Stories: 1976 Science Fiction, Part 1

Below I discuss the first three 1976 science fiction stories appearing in the anthology Donald A. Wollheim Presents The 1977 Annual World's Best SF, covering the editor's selections from the previous year.  1976 was the American Bicentennial Year with nationwide celebrations that summer.  It was also the first presidential election year I was old enough to vote in, picking peanut farmer/nuclear engineer/Playboy magazine interviewee Jimmy Carter over Gerald Ford, who apparently hadn't been aware that Poland was a puppet state of the Soviet Union at the time.  For me it was a more relaxed, introspective year...the last one I would ever spend living completely in South Florida.  Anyway, without further ado, here are my reactions to those stories... 

APPEARANCE OF LIFE by Brian W. Aldiss

A very complex and multi-layered story, a human of the distant future belonging to the Seeker class is exploring a galactic museum in the process of being built and stocked with exhibits...all inside a massive constructed belt ringing an uninhabitable planet placed there in great antiquity by a mysterious non-human race that preceded humanity in exploring and dominating our galaxy.  In it he finds two cubes containing holographic images and programs of the personalities and voices of a married couple...long dead from an earlier war...and places the cubes facing one another so that they can converse.  Doing this he discovers the meaning of life and everything...I said this was a very complex and multi-layered story! 

OVERDRAWN AT THE MEMORY BANK by John Varley

Stuck in exile within the Moon after an alien conquest of Earth drove away humanity, what's left of our dwindled race is virtually immortal, with people's memories and essences storable and transferable from one body to another.  A man decides to spend his vacation at an "inner-Moon" wildlife theme park and has his mind implanted within a lion to experience its way of life.  But his original body gets lost and to preserve him, his mind is placed within the master computer while the frantic search is on.  Another pretty complicated tale...you can't read through this one quickly...

THOSE GOOD OLD DAYS OF LIQUID FUEL by Michael G. Coney

In the future interstellar travel is commonplace and easy due to the advent of anti-gravity to propel spaceships.  A man remembers the old gigantic, primitive spaceships that ran on liquid fuel and, hearing that a nearby shipyard of them is slated to be demolished, visits the site and waxes nostalgic on his youth and his friend who shared his interest in the rockets...along with the eventual conflicts that would divide them. A bittersweet tale that kind of reminded me how Ray Bradbury wrote...

Next week I'll discuss more science fiction short stories from the year 1976...