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...