What's So Hot About 2014?

Recently I read something about 2014 being on the way to being the warmest year on record.  I'm not sure where I read it, and I am trying to kick a habit, so I can't tell you for sure.  I think it was a headline for a newspaper article, and the only "paper" paper I read is the one and only ISLAND PACKET, Serving the Lowcountry. soooo....  (But I may have read it as a headline on the online version of a newspaper, and I look at three of them on a not-so-regular basis).

Oh, and the Packet's status as the only "paper" paper in my life is changing.  I took advantage of an offer from The Wall Street Journal for 12 weeks for only $12.  The only issue is that I had to give them a credit card authorization to automatically charge me $32.49 per month after this special introductory rate runs out, unless I cancel my subscription before they submit that charge at the end of the 11th week.  Now, I won't forget that, because, while I like the The Wall Street Journal, there is no way it is worth $389.88 a year.  Over the years, I once paid $149 for a year ( I believe it was 2006, but I could be off by 3 years or so....) but never more than that.  Where was I?  Oh, yeah, "... the warmest year on record..."

I still am not sure where I read that, I should look it up, but there's that habit.  The habit?  I am trying to stop looking up every thing that slips my mind for more than a moment by "googling" it on my smart phone.  I swear it is causing me to lose faith in my own memory.  I fear becoming completely reliant on Google for remembering everything for me.  I'm even tempted at times to "google" where I left my socks, and, pray tell me what I will have to do when I misplace my smart phone and it doesn't ring when I borrow someone else's phone to call mine so I can find it, and so on..., and don't tell me about that locator app you can put on your phone, I know the FBI is involved in that one somehow, so I have no intention of even "googling" what that app is much less putting it on my phone.

So, the gist of the article was that, globally at least, the average temperature on Earth will set the record for the warmest recorded.  The World Meteorological Organization, a United Nations Agency, announced this as a "preliminary finding."  It became mind-numbingly detailed about the increase of

What's So Hot About 2014?

1.03 degrees in the average temperatures from January thru September of 2014 above the 1961 to 1990 reference period, yada, yada, yada....  My point is that everyone I know who lived in North America has pointed out that last winter was one of the coldest or snowiest (or both) winters they can remember,  This winter is shaping up to be even worse (tell those poor people in Buffalo, NY where more than six and a half feet of snow fell in a day or so this is the warmest year in recorded history.  Tell everyone in the Midwest who are seeing snow in November and freezing temperatures nearly every night since the beginning of November.  People, people, people, this average temperature stuff is slippery.  You cannot tell me it's getting warmer than ever when we keep having harsher and harsher winters.

Try telling me.  I now own a "space" heater, purchased to supplement the heat produced by our nearly new heat pumps (these really ought to be called "no heat pumps," but that's another story).  And I live on the South Carolina coast! Why did we invest in this machine from space?  The mah-jongg ladies were unable to get warm when we hosted last week!  Now, they were sitting at a tablee on a ceramic-tiled floor (not known for its warming properties) adjacent to our screen porch on one side, and backing up to an expanse of four windows approximately 18 inches above the floor, and extending five and a half feet up from there facing west in the morning.  These were not exactly prime conditions for staying toasty warm, but we did buy a "space" heater (What do these things have to do with outer space, anyway?).   Don't believe everything the United Nations tells you.

P.S.  Yes--you guessed right--I did "google" the article after all.  It produced "about 15,600,000 results in 0.44 seconds," only slightly faster than the half hour it would have taken for me to remember where to look for the article.

Stealing Stradivarius

Stealing Stradivarius

If I were going to write a novel, I'm pretty sure what its subject would be.  The villain of the piece would be an Itzhak Perlman look-alike who wants to add a touch of larceny to the great man's legacy by nearly getting caught with the item in question, then slipping away.   As I watch the story unfold, it occurred to me that such thefts must have happened many times.  These instruments have been so rare for so long.  I am not sure how many I would indicate are in existence today, I have seen a list of six hundred and fifty, but heard estimates as high as eleven hundred.  There have been fakes discovered.  Dendrochronology (the science of determining the age of wood) has proven the age of various impostors, proving they really weren't made of wood harvested in the 1600's.

The modern ear is apparently losing its ability to pick out the real thing in blind listening tests.  It's true.  That special sound said to be specific to the instruments manufactured by the Stradivari family in the late 17th and early 18th centuries is hard for audiences to pick out in live performances.  I know which violin would be the one that disappears as well.  It is the Baumgartner (yes, they have names, these violins).  You see the Baumgartner is presently on loan to Iryna Krechkovsky until 2015.  The Baumgartner would vanish in the last week of the loan's term.

One reason I have selected this one is the striking coincidence in this name--my hair stylist is named Iryna, and I have an appointment with her again tomorrow.  Imagine Iryna K. sighing as the days of December dwindle down to the single digits (even today, she has only twenty-three days left before she must return it to the Canada Council for the Arts).

The villain would recruit my hair stylist to impersonate the actual Iryna K.  She would step backstage on the night of the 3rd-to-last performance for Iryna K. and make off with the Baumgartner, giving it to the Itzhak Perlman look-alike, who will disappear.  Why my hair stylist?  Well, it turns out one of the most difficult tasks for an impostor Iryna is to be able to pronounce her own name with precisely the correct number (and quality) of "rolls" the "R" that must be sounded when saying the name.  Only a person of this same first name would be able to pull it off.  Of course, all the while, my hair stylist Iryna will have been duped by this man into believing he is really the renowned violinist, who has tragically misplaced his own Strad and wants just one more time to play a Stradivarius (of course he has to  trick her into it, my Iryna would never stoop to theft--grand or otherwise).  She would do it  to honor one of the final wishes of an artist of his stature.... (yes, he would tell her he has only a short time to live--hey, he's a villain, what can I say?).

When she wakes up on January 1st and learns that "Itzhak" did not return the Baumgartner by December 31st, she realizes what has happened.  She recruits a trio of her customers (I'm thinking one of them would be a handsome sixty-ish guy with curly grey hair and, well you know...) to help her get it back and restore the honor of the other "Iryna."  To do this, the hair stylist Iryna and her customers put together a scheme to steal the real Itzhak Perlman's Stradivarius (named Soil, after the Belgian Industrialist, Amedee Soil), knowing the fake "Itzhak" will be unable to resist the chance to obtain another (given that one of these "Strads" has sold for more than $13 million) when the hair stylist Iryna contacts him to find out where she can fence her newly-acquired Stradivarius.  Once he shows up, they can spring their trap and recover "Baumgartner."  Of course, nothing ever turns out exactly how it's planned now, does it?        

A Moment of Inattention, A Place Lost

A Moment of Inattention, A Place Lost

It's so unlike me.  I can't understand how it happened.  The recording regularly interrupted the muzak of the call waiting to apologize for keeping me waiting, but pointing out that the Social Security Administration oversees benefits for more than fifty million people and that they were taking the calls in the order received.   (So, Wait Your Turn!)

This went on for forty minutes before I began making dinner.  Grilled flounder is usually cooked on foil, I was told.  Just apply some non-stick spray and place the flounder,  skin side down, on the grill after seasoning, of course.  You can't really over-season fish, or so the contributor at Cooks.com had observed in the recipe I found when I posed the question--"What the heck do you season flounder with when you grill it?" to Google.  I know, I'm supposed to say I googled it, but I am being circumspect about grammar and usage today, having read and written a good deal about grammar and usage in the past few days.  (That's yet another draft lurking on the underside of this collection.  Right now I am working on three of them, and am not satisfied that any of them is "finished."  Suddenly, I feel the need to finish things I publish here?).

Back to last evening--I was ready to shift my attention to the grill, which I had to light with a log lighter as the sparking mechanism that usually ignites the grill is either hibernating in the "cold" weather we've had, or has succumbed to corrosion due to near-constant habitation by humidity.  I almost chose "erosion" back there, but the waves have not been lapping at my grill--they remain at the beach, wearing away our piped-in sand which must be brought in about once every eight to ten years in a process known as beach restoration.  I guess the theory is that the sand being sucked up about a half-mile or so out in the water was once our sandy beach, and piping it in as a slurry, then repeatedly running it over with giant bulldozers to wring the water out and flatten the surface is a "restorative process."  Tell that to all the crustaceans, who--if they survive the crushing force of the bulldozers--find themselves lying in the sun (with eyes having no lids or lashes to deal with all that light and dry sand) instead of lying beneath fifteen or so feet of water.  I'm thinking they don't feel "restored" at all.

Where was I?  Oh, lighting the grill, so I maneuvered through the door, holding the log lighter, squeezing the phone between my chin and collar bone and administering a light hip-check to the dolor.  I lit the grill, and waited five minutes more (with at least eight repetitions of the abject apology, accompanied by a preventive scolding if the selfish desire to move ahead of any of the fifty million others being served by the Social Security Administration, who apparently are all on hold, should be starting to form i my dulled consciousness induced by all this muzak, constantly interrupted, etc., etc., etc.).  After waiting five minutes to heat up the grill, I quickly wire-brushed it and was ready for the flounder.  I went back into the house and got the two pieces of flounder, now sitting on little aluminum foil rafts awaiting the voyage on the grill.  I placed each on the grill one-handed (the other hand was still holding the phone).  I then realized I had no tool with which to move the flounder around with on the now-hot aluminum foil and grill.  I walked back into the house, hung up the phone and picked up a spatula and started back out to the grill.  As I reached for the door, I realized it, I was missing something.   I actually had a hand free to turn the knob and push the door open.  My hips were not required for this maneuver, and nothing was squeezed between my chin and collar bone.  I had hung up the phone.  No multitasker here.  An hour of holding wasted.  I have lost my place in line.

It's morning now, and I am ready to call the SSA again, although I find it increasingly difficult to stop myself from reversing those initials I just mentioned.  OK, where's that number--I wonder if I could just hit redial.  OK, I am on hold again, waiting my turn.

What's for breakfast, an omelet perhaps?  Where's that frying pan?  The Pam spray...Oh, and eggs, a little cheese, pooh, and there's some green pepper I can slice up and saute in that other little frying pan if I pull that out and light this burner.  Now, if I turn this burner on....    

Perspective--Things You Don't Like And Things You Do

Perspective--Things You Don't Like And Things You Do

Think about something that drives you crazy. Now, think about something that makes you happy. Does it change your perspective on the former? 

Something that drives me crazy is the political attack advertising we are subjected to during the election season here (I'm not certain how long that is, but my guess is it's six months long--probably just seems that long).  I'm sure many of you share the same opinion--they spend all their time calling each other spineless, lying, cheating scoundrels, while all the while evading the question as to how they really will do anything or support anything.  Ours were like a series of cannonballs lobbed at each other.  One would accuse the other of something egregious and evil, then the other would reply calling his or her opponent a liar, and deny whatever he or she was accused of doing, then pointing to the opponent and calling him or her a liar and a chest, and on and on and on...

Ours was especially gruesome as the attackers were buying time on local radio and TV stations that broadcast to both their own state and ours.  Thus, we were hearing all this malarkey about an election in which we DO NOT HAVE A VOTE!  (Sorry about the screaming, but this does drive me crazy.  

Now the problem is I have to name something that makes me happy and I can only think about THOSE STUPID ATTACK ADS!

I think I am going to have to do something to get them off my mind... 

So, I have just returned from a walk around my house.  I am refreshed.  What did I do?  I ate two toot rolls (the only sweets I could find), a stepped out on my upstairs balcony and felt the chilly breeze (it's in the 50's here and I am only wearing a long-sleeved tee shirt), and watched the fading afternoon sun as it descended behind a building across the inlet.  Then I grabbed a book of poems off the shelf in our bedroom and read two of my favorite poems by Billy Collins--"The Lanyard" and "The Trouble With Poetry."  (I'd write them right here, but you can go to youtube and type in the title of the former and its author.  You'll get a reading by the author).   So, now I am relieved.  Have these three little escapes have made me "happy?"  Well, not exactly, but I am happier so I think this handles the second part to the prompt up above.  Now has it changed my perspective on those "attack ads?"  DUH?

OK, OK...  Let's turn that question around.  Has thinking about those attack ads changed my perspective on things I like?  No, apparently not.  So, no harm done, I suppose.  I won't be moving to Australia as the next election year rolls around after all.

Loving Yourself

Loving Yourself

Love to love you
What do you love most about yourself? What do you love most about your favorite person? Are the two connected? 

"Love about myself?"  I thought you weren't allowed to "love yourself."  That would reflect a massive ego or something called narcissism, I think.  Maybe I should look that one up.  "Having an excessive interest in oneself or one's physical appearance."  So much for liking my body for deciding to cooperate in reaching my goal weight this year.   Yes, I dropped a few pounds--well, if you've had a reasonably close look at me (say within a hundred yards or so) you'd say I had to lose quite a few--I could go on, but the point is that excessive focus on oneself is not a good beginning to any interaction.  So, I am a little stuck.  Loving something about myself is not so good, right?

But some amount of self-love is necessary for growth and survival.  Narcissism is more about the degree of self-love,  We all need enough self-love, just not so much.   So what do I love about myself?  Let me see, I think I'm....

Maybe this will work better in reverse.  What do I like most about my favorite person--OK, "love" most about my favorite person.  She swears--I am not making this up--that I once told her with a straight face that what I loved most about her was that she loved me.  I think you might now be able to better understand why this prompt gives me so much trouble.  I'm running around in circles here.

I guess the important thing to learn was right in front of me all the time.  The starting point is to love yourself.  Then move on to the people that love you, then....  Don't over-analyze, just do it--of course they are connected.  I just can't tell you exactly how.

Saturday Mornings Remain A Treat Or Should I Say Retreat?

Saturday Mornings Remain A Treat Or Should I Say Retreat?

It's quiet now, just me and what I'm thinking.  Saturdays when I arise before the rest and the business of this busy day has not yet been declared.  It feels just as true as it did when I was working.  A brief respite, a quiet cup of coffee, with no other obligation.  Sure, I can go out and get the paper.  For someone else to read, nothing's urgent to me at moments like this.

I'd rather sit and look about, watching water roll back to our inlet, wondering where it's been this time since the tide rolled it out some hours ago.  Is it the same water now, just back from a visit to the Sound?  I can't see how it would be kept together once it went into the Sound.  Even the creatures that inhabit these waters may not wind up here in the same place when the great force of the tide pushes the sea back in.   They could have spent their entire lives until today out in the Sound, or in some other inlet not so far away.  Today they'll spend in ours.  I imagine they feel as if they are sheltered here in our shallow space.  Here, the sun warms them, and there are no waves to toss or push or pull them this way and that.  Things are calm and peaceful, do they enjoy this sort of day and place.

Oh, they may be eaten by something larger, caught by larger creatures of the Sea--we've spotted dolphins feeding in our inlet--more than once a mother and its young.  Perhaps places like this are where they're taught to hunt for food.

The creatures washed in here by the tides might be even be caught by people fishing from the occasional bateaux that float in and cast their bait.  For most this will only be a misadventure--once caught, they're quickly released.   Released because they exceed a size limit for their species, or a bag limit for the fisherman, or simply because the fisherman values more the catching of the fish, not taking it home as food.  But today's chillier than most, so the fishermen will be scarce.  

If they escape all that hunting going on during this day, then they'll once again wash out to sea, perhaps never to return.  We believe these creatures lack a consciousness, so they don't think about where they've been or where they're going, they just exist.  Like some humans (perhaps all of us at some times) living without reflection, just plodding through their days.  But what if they have this consciousness?  What do they think of these daily visits?  Do they look forward to new places, or do they long to return here to our small space, where they can rest, a retreat for some who might just enjoy these visits like I do a quiet Saturday morning.

Make A List

Make A List

If you had to make a list of all the things family members would need to know if you suddenly went away, what would it include?  Accounts, passwords, poems, feelings never shared.  It would be too easy to just turn on the maudlin faucet for this one, so I am just spinning out the obscure details that have started popping up since I heard for the second time, "I need to know about that," from a certain someone.

The subject at hand was the explanation for a fund available to each of us (my wife and myself) from my former employer since I had been a certain age when they eliminated their own medigap plan for retirees 65 and over in 2000.  Creating this fund relieved my employer of the necessity to go on administering a plan for a population of retiring employees that will, for lack of a better expression, die off slowly over the coming forty to fifty years.

Leaving a lump sum to cover such a plan for a year or two when purchased on the open market let my employer drop this plan a bit less painfully.  Do companies really feel pain when they eliminate a costly benefit?   Probably not, but a sense of fair play does show up in decisions like this one made by my former employer.

The other subject it raised was a savings plan (including some company match) that same company set up when it had (a few years earlier) eliminated health benefits for retirees under 65.  I need to create an easy-to-follow file for accessing that one.  

That leads to the various pensions that trickle in from older former employers (are the employers I worked for and left earlier in my career "older employers?").   Well, that depends on who's working there now, but I expect all the employees are younger than yours truly.  The employer itself has also been in existence longer now than it had been when I left them, so are they an "older employer?"  The company I most recently left has been around for more than 160 years, so it is, in fact, my oldest employer.   They are all my former employers, but some are "former-er" than others, and one is the "former-est" (Don't look at me, "more former" and "most former" don't sound much better to me).  If indeed she survives being married to me that long, she'll need some guidance on how to contact these pension funds to stop my pension and claim her surviving spouse's benefit.

I am satisfied that Social Security will over-communicate with her on the subject of those survivor benefits.  I have been buried in paper over just becoming eligible for medicare, so if they are still in existence when I expire, she will get all the help she needs from then for Social Security and Medicare benefits.  I have to go back for just a second--"expire"--isn't that just the best expression for kicking the bucket you've ever heard?  It has lots of layers.  Is it like an old magazine subscription that expires and stops showing up?  Or is it like an out-of-date prescription medication hanging around your medicine cabinet too long--too old to be trusted any more?  OK, there's a rabbit trail we don't need to follow.  (Or is it like a free offer on some kind of free product its maker wants you to get hooked on?)

Back to the list, do you have a list of all your latest passwords for accounts, newsletters, web sites, e-mail accounts, old blogs--set up, but abandoned for a while, etc., etc.  How else will they ever find out the balance you owe or they owe you if you don't provide usernames and passwords (BTW. "username" does not yet pass muster with s p e l l  c h e c k e r s,  i t  s h o u l d  b e " u s e r  n a m e--isthatenoughspacesforyou,spellcheck?).  Come to think of it, BTW probably doesn't work for the spellcheckers either (note the space eliminated in the name of spell checkers, I may just win this one).  I kid you not, I just went to spell check and I got this message--"An error occurred while trying to perform this function, please try again later."  Yes...

Then there are the mysteries of bill payer functions in your checking account.  What's the difference between autopay of e-bills and automatic recurring payments, and what about autopay of minimum payment due on certain credit card accounts?  Some of this I set up myself and can't exactly explain.  Maybe this one needs some work before sharing....

Old email accounts--how many of you have set up an "ad/junk mail receiving account?  Some of these web sites want us to use our email address as a username, which allows them to send a multitude of ads, special offers and other useless news about special rates to Aruba in July, etc.  I have a different email I never really visit that gets all that junk.  Old blogs--I have set up and not really made public a blog or two over the past few years where works in progress are stored--you may not believe it, but there even worse poems I have written that are sitting there in case I ever want to try to salvage them.  

It goes on, but I have to stop for a while and go somewhere.

Sweatshirt Weather

Sweatshirt Weather

We knew it was wishful thinking then.  In August when we bought new sweatshirts in anticipation.  How much longer could hot weather hold out in SC anyway?  A long, long time, it turns out.   We had consistent eighty degree weather until this week.  Even with highs in the mid-70's, you really needn't do much more than don a long-sleeved shirt.

There was even an ominous event that accompanied one of my initial days of long-sleeved shirt wearing.  For the first time in my life that I can recall (oh shut your face, I can too remember what I did yesterday), a bird scored a direct hit on me (my shirt actually) in a certain sort of "bombing run" the nature of which I am sure you understand quite clearly without further elaboration on my part.  Anyway, all that is past.  Today's high will be 54 degrees Fahrenheit.  As I sit here, however, the winds are howling by and I'm thinking a windbreaker layer will be required.  But, for now, on goes my Saugatuck sweatshirt made by Gear, the company that makes the best sweatshirts I have ever worn.

I know sweatshirt weather will never be the cultural icon that flip flops have been.  People around these parts wear flip flops, and visitors will wear them no matter what the weather.  I actually bought a pair of flip flops this year, but have resisted wearing them for the most part--just me being rebellious, I guess.  They are everywhere, and the noise they make--flip flop, flip flop, FLIP FLOP, flip flop, flip flop, flip flop, Flip Flop...  It goes on and on.  Do sweatshirts have such an annoying presence?  No, except perhaps in what's written on them--which you can control by exercising a little self-control.  No "I'm with Stupid ->," and no "Older Than Dirt," etc.  

Well, enjoy your day, I have to go outside in my sweatshirt and enjoy the moment... 

NOVEMBER ONE’S

November One's

Wicked westerly winds wakened us--
Wishing winter would wander our way
We weren’t wanting wintry winds which would
Whip our windowpanes.

We weren’t wishing winds to
Wreak wanton waste
A winter wretchedly
Wiping away whatever waited here.

Blows buffeted boughs bending above us.
Building biceps into branches.
Bewildering birds about, who
Saw sparkling sunlight in the East,
Sought safety on the sand,
slumping, seeming to sleep,
Sensing an urge to search southern skies
Safer skies than our November One’s

EATING’S A BALANCE

Eating's A Balance

There are days when I eats
Almost nothing but sweets.
Eating sweets is for me such a compulsion.
That the health food crowd has threatened expulsion

Other days I eat healthy,
My plate’s vitamin-wealthy
Full of veggies and greens
Like kale and green beans.

Today at the movies, we just ate M&M’s
Not leafy greens with crunchy stems
But we’ll make up for it later
With a supper much greater.

If I recall correctly
It’s to be seafood directly
Removed from the deep fryer
Eating all we desire.

But please do not disparage us
‘cause we’ll be adding asparagus.

A Great Thing, and Sharing A Few Discoveries

A Great Thing, and Sharing A Few Discoveries

There is a great thing I've discovered about writing here.  I can wander off the reservation whenever it comes to mind and receive no criticism about it.  Like many other people I'm sure (or maybe I'm all alone this way!) I'm usually first in line to offer criticism of what I do.  It's perfectly normal for me to criticize myself before anyone else gets around to it.  I've been asked more than once why I choose to write here instead of some sort of personal journal, and I have been at a loss to explain it.  I enjoy reflecting on things that pass my way, and hope that other people will see this and say one of the following:  "That's goofy, why would anyone think that way," or "By Jove he's got it right!" or "What is wrong with this nut case?" Or, "I totally disagree with this whole line of reasoning and I'm not going to even look at this again," or "He's right, you know, I just never looked at it that way."  Or, one might say "OK, it's mildly entertaining, so I'll read on." or....

In the end it really doesn't matter.  At least I know what I'm noticing will not be inaccessible.  If anybody wants to know what I thought of late one evening or early one morning, here it will be, to the extent that I could express it.

I've taken to jotting the briefest of notes to capture things that strike me during the day, and, if I feel like I have nothing to say, I can look back at these cryptic references and try to recall why I thought it noteworthy at all.  Today's notes--Shrimp Shack, Spaghetti Squash, Chocolate Tree, Lowcountry Store and Oh, Canada (really a note I should have made yesterday, but I forgot), and lastly, is Jury Duty still one of my duties?

Our motoring adventure on this, a gorgeous Fall day in South Carolina, was to venture to Beaufort, SC, the county seat to which I have been summoned to appear for jury duty.  This is the second call, my previous one was to municipal court in Bluffton, SC, where I made an appearance about eight weeks ago, and was dismissed with the thanks of the court when all matters set for trial were either settled or postponed.  I received, just this past week, a check in the amount of $26.95--ten dollars of which was termed "subsistence" and the remaining $16.95 reimbursement for mileage expenses.  How these numbers were arrived at probably did not include deliberation by any jury, as the potential jurors who were dismissed with me grumbled about the time they had lost--as if to say we would have retained that time and kept it for some other time when it might be more useful.  Let's say at the end of life on this earth, although my present understanding of those final hours is such that I might not want two or three more hours of extension.  So, where would I have spent these two hours?  Nowhere special, I think.  Just where and when they were.  Hence, whether they were wasted or not had been up to me and not the Municipal Court of Bluffton, SC--a town in which I do not reside, unless or until my wife persuades me to move to Sun City Hilton Head for the camaraderie and socialization it might afford us.  The notion of wasting or even spending such hours is preposterous, isn't it?  I mean, time passes, with or without our petty little decisions to "spend" or "waste" it.  Oh but this is probably farther down that path any of us wanted to go, so...

Back to Beaufort, SC.  We found our way, and determined it was suitably simple to allow even a dullard like me to locate it (as long as I had the help of the car’s satellite navigator, I mean, there were two turns after leaving our residential area).

After that, we pursued the Shrimp Shack, which turned out to be nearly thirty minutes further along the same road as the courthouse.  It was (and probably still is) named the Shrimp Shack.  There we lunched on shrimp burgers, cole slaw and diet coke.  Moments later, despite my spouse's concern as to whether we had ordered enough or not, we headed back.  We stopped at a pumpkin stand in search of Spaghetti Squash (see 2nd note above)--I guess the people minding the stand looked to be likely suspects in possession of spaghetti squash, I don't know, and if you don't know what spaghetti squash is, why should you even care?

Next stop (see third note above), as I had hoped, was the Chocolate Tree, a small chocolate shop which I believe to be the only real justification for the existence of Beaufort,  Sorry, Beaufort people, you should have shown me something better than a few over-priced seafood restaurants and a riverfront park if you wanted me to remember you for anything beyond the Chocolate Tree.  I escaped that store having spent slightly less than I had at the Shrimp Shack (mainly because I acted as if my wallet was stuck in my pocket and I was having trouble getting it out in time to pay the cashier).  My wife paid for the twelve dollars worth of chocolates (hey, lunch was $19.76!).

We stopped at the Lowcountry Store and another similar shop in Beaufort and escaped without further damage to my pocket.  The latter two stores consisted of stalls maintained by a collection of local artists who “over priced” their work by charging about half the minimum wage for each hour they had spent painstakingly creating their various works of art.  You do that sort of work for the joy of creating it, not to make a profit, of course.    

On to Oh, Canada--I was traveling and in recovery therefrom when the recent tragic shootings in Canada took place.  Oddly enough, the morning of our own Washington State school shooting, I saw an editorial cartoon of the U.S. President making a condolence call to Canada's Prime Minister, in which our President was depicted saying, "I'm sorry, Mr. Prime Minister, here in the U.S., we call it Wednesday."  To me, that simply meant that these had become commonplace in the U. S., even to our highest elected official.  To Canada, these things are not so at all, hence the ceremony I observed at the opening of a professional hockey game where the Canadian people visibly pulled together and sang their national anthem to honor their dead and the bravery of those who put a stop to their shootings.  I was moved to tears, but now I sit and wonder--what will it mean to "pull together?"  We haven't after thirteen years or so after 9/11 and a series of tragic school and workplace shootings figured out what to do, except to care a little more about one another, I think.  But that promptly disappears when that other fella pulls out in front of you in the road.  In Italy and France, I saw all sorts of aggressive driving and people cutting amiably in front of one another, but I never saw a driver express anger openly toward another.  No road rage?  I wonder why?  Well, that’s all folks.

How Fast Do Frenchmen Walk, An Impression of Impressionists, etc.

How Fast Do Frenchmen Walk, An Impression of Impressionists, etc.

Our friends have gone home, we've moved on to Paris.  I have some hard~earned wisdom to share. Never trust a Frenchman's estimate of the time it will take to walk somewhere. When we got up this morning, we planned to hop a B~train to the Eiffel Tower, walk around a bit. then keep a reservation for lunch halfway up the Tower. when we talked to the concierge, he reported there had been a serious crash on the B~line and it would be down for some time. The weather was delightful, so we asked how long it might take to walk. "Oh,thirty~five minutes," he said. An hour and a half later, we staggered to the ticket office to pick up our passes to go to lunch. I had not watched all sorts of Frenchmen striding past us, either.  

But, who's complaining? After a marvellous lunch as we swayed in the sky--yes, like lots of other tall structures, the Tower sways noticeably--we took a taxi to the best Art Museum I've ever seen- Musee' d'Orsay in Paris. Although we had already walked our legs off, touring the museum was worth the pain. It's collection seems to focus on some of my favorite art. After a week and a half of Renaissance painters and sculptors, we moved among the impressionist. My new observation of Impressionist for the day--I like what they do with the skies.  

The Trip Home and Napping In Recovery

As travelers, we are sometimes our own worst enemies.  Our friends booked their trips home to include three different stops, four airports.  We had only one takeoff and landing, but we appended a four and a half hour drive to the finish to save ourselves the "hassle" of taking two planes and making a connection.

The consequence for our friends was a twenty-some hour trip to their hometown airport.
Our trip itself was only nineteen in total, but on our travel day, we were awake for twenty seven hours, since our trip did not begin until late afternoon.  Oh, but we know how to plan the perfect climax.  That car ride was an experience, it ended at 3:30 AM in a driving rain.

You might observe that at least it's over with, so to speak.  But this is our fourth day home, and as I write this, I am waiting for my dear wife to awaken from yet another lengthy nap.  She has found a daily nap or two necessary in order to keep her always cheerful disposition.  She is worried that nap-taking is addictive.  I can't say, because I have not tried to quit my nap-taking habit (I think I have been napping almost every day for a year or more).  Oh well, I think I'll end this and lean back and rest for a while (Yawn).

Some Tour Guides Are Better Than Others

Hereabouts, tour guides are plentiful.  There appear to be several challenging qualifications.  They must be able to speak several languages fluently and have to either learn their subjects thoroughly or quickly memorize a script~which is a distant 2nd best. 

[hmmm, typing before your anti~tremor meds kick in--an opportunity that arises once every four waking hours and upon starting each day--can produce interesting lessons.  Today, I learned that "either" can be readily respelled, note: I didn't say misspelled, these are actual correct spellings of another word entirely~as in either, dither, zither, and wither, but not eithen, pithen, etc.)

Ah, but back to second best.  A tour guide who doesn't know his or her subject will not be able to display passion for the subject matter.  The best of the half dozen tour guides we've encountered was informative and thorough, of course; but she was also passionate about the artist she most admired.  It came through when she said his name, when she recounted events in his life and when she talked about people who did him a disservice.  It came through without any drama or overstatement on her part.  We all saw it, and it impressed us.  It was a judgement several of us formed independently during the tour and pointed out later.  The script-memorizer promptly gives the impression that they believe the most important thing is not the questions their touring party members have, nor is it the item along the way that makes the members stop and admire them, rather, it is getting through the script.  Soon the customers stop asking questions, even when the script calls for the leader to solicit them.  

Another missing element with the script-reader is humor.  While such a person can learn an expression or two to use to inject humor, but inevitably they overuse it.  One of our guides used an expression she had learned to inject.  It was "C'mon, did they really _____.  She would insert some unrealistic expectation or aspiration of the subject of the exhibit.  It was a subtle way of expressing the thought that that person was over the top in one respect or another.  She knew when to use it, and she did so--probably ten or twelve times.  The first two or three were not bad, but the rest of them were really just overdone.  The best guides we had were able to express humor in a variety of ways--relating to historical figures, to people they had on tours in the past, and themselves.  It takes a certain amount of mastery of the language to do this, and while all of the guides met the qualification of being able to make themselves understood in English, they simply could not inject humor.  

One final consideration that affected tour guide performance was just having too much on their plate.  One of our tour leaders had to cover the languages.  Ours was a mixed group, so the tour had to be spoken in both languages in turn.  As a result, the guide could only provide half as much attention, response to questions, and more.  Another way of giving a tour guide too much to do is to travel on several different public forms of transport.  Most groups numbered twenty persons or more, so keeping track of all of them can be inconvenient.  It's way note than inconvenient when a late-arriving tour member arrives at the rendezvous point for the next leg of the journey.  We had a guide who was quite good when it came to answering questions, and making conversation about the subject of the tour when sh had time to do it.  But we had two trains and a boat to catch who operated on their schedule, not hers.  She had to round up her group and ensure that all were present so often that she was able to offer little narrative about where we were going, or what we were looking at.  Managers of tours, you are no different from mot businesses.  When you load up your good employees with too much to do, quality suffers.  Keep it in mind.  Can all this information help you the reader?  Probably not, but it was on my mind.

Monday

Monday was a slow day.
A watching people shop day.
Pestered by the gypsies every time we sat.
No art for us to study, only standing pat.

No laundry to do, just a bunch of walking.
No great discoveries made, just  plenty of talking

Followed by the best lasagna in Northern Italy,
Consumed in a tent, during a driving rain.
A special ending to an ordinary day,
In a place where marvels are often in play.

Why Was I Thinking Of Gilligan Today?

First of all, it was a thirteen hour tour, not a three hour tour.  Secondly, despite their efforts to make the island feel like home, there was never a burger chain involved with Gilligan.  But I thought of him just the same.  It may have had something to do with the fact that our tour included travel between and among five "islands" of a sort, specifically, the Cinque. d' Terre.  Who would have thought Italy would even have a national park? It just sounds to American somehow. Cinque d' Terre is a collection of five fishing villages that typify such places as they existed for centuries along the Ligorian shore of the Mediterranean Sea.  Italy has created a tourist attraction that is beautiful and majestic.  Walking their streets and boating between them gave a splendid pair of perspectives.  One close-up and touching the stone streets the shops, the churches and the homes of its inhabitants.  The other offers a view of these villages perched on the sides of mountains, green with vegetation, even trees that seem to rise out of the sea.  Their vibrant colors add to the natural beauty of the place.  It was a joy.

However, it was a thirteen hour excursion.  And it included lots of walking and stair-climbing.  It was an ordeal in some respects.  Who can blame us for the moment of weakness that put us in a Burger King in Florence, Italy (not to be confused with Florence, Alabama, where Burger King visits are much more common).  On average, the eight of us probably averaged four years since our last visit to any Burger King.  Yet we took some TEMPORARY comfort there.  I say temporary, because after walking home, we data in our living room groaning about how our stomachs felt.  It all made.me wonder  if we might not have been better off on one of Gilligan's three hour tours, even with the risk those entailed.

A Bigger Get Me To The Church On Time--The Vatican Tour

Waiting at the Foot Locker store next to the Piazza of St. Peter's Basilica.  Domes, ceilings, walls covered in art.  Some in mosaics, even underfoot.  People, people, people. Shoulder-to-shoulder and cheek-to-cheek, literally. Popes entombed, one pope's corpse on display.  Twenty-five thousand people a day take the tour. Nine million people.  Lines snaking behind your guides as they dodge each other.  Ready to fall down at the finish.  But lunch revives us, and we resume the role of lost travelers trying to follow maps deliberately not made to scale.  Why would your hotel provide a map deliberately not made to scale?  Why to minimize the distance from.the hotel to the various major attractions to the casual eye.

We limp home--Ah, but dinner under the moonlight.  How many times have we done that?  The restaurant had a bit of sadness to it.  The hotel building attached to the restaurant but always a separate entity had failed just a year ago, and the empty building shielded the restaurant from our view on the side from which we approached.  But dinner err was excellent, and, as we stepped away from the building to look at an olive tree, and turned back toward the restaurant-we saw what this restaurant building had once been before the hulking hotel was added-a vine-covered inn bathed in the light of a full moon.

Touring and being lost have walked our legs off.  Next day we'll know the territory better--how bad can walking be when you know where you're going?

Am I Walkative Or Talkative?

Am I Walkative or Talkative?

Caught a cab to the Colisseum to start the day.  Walked up to the top of the plaza of the king,  celebrates the unification of Italy in 1861 .  Honoring Victor  Emanuel...after the fall of the Roman Empire, the first time Italy was re~unified was in 1861, folllowed by designation of a rebuilding Rome as its capital in 1871.  Decided to sit at a cafe across the street. waiting for our more  walkative lfriends who walked the Forum~including the Colisseum, Palatine Hill and the Pantheon.  When their stretched from.two hours to four, we opted for returning to the hotel to talk and relax with a wee bit of wine in lieu of studious pursuits.     Dinner at the hotel with several more bottles of wine for our thirsty walkers  was surprisingly good.  We all relaxed, enjoying our last night in Rome.


Jim B

Erupting From Rome

Erupting From Rome

Spending the day remembering Vesuvius And Pompeii is important. They built their city on lava, created their streets using old lava stones and forgot Vesuvius towered over them. They didn't know what a volcanic eruption was when it struck.

In a way it is similar to the way in which we regard the whole miracle that surrounds us here and now.  We take it for granted.

Another Fast Train To Firenze

Another Fast Train To Firenze

Another fast train back to Firenze, then a "couple of blocks" rolling our suitcases. Turned out to be the longest couple of blocks in recorded history. Arrived to a staircase of 20 steps. Once up there, we relaxed (which required a trip to the grocery for wine and cheese, etc.).  

Wandered the plazas nearby and found a cafe down an alley where we enjoyed a dinner with wine at a reasonable price. We made up for that with breakfast where we were charged $50 for coffee.  Thirty minutes later we found a small cafe with coffee for one Euro.  From there we managed to resolve never to eat breakfast at that place, and headed for home, on the way we decided to do laundry.

talk about fun.

Irascible Italian and The Two IQ Tests (New Add 10/15)

Irascible Italian and The Two IQ Tests

You might think one against eight might penetrate even the feeble~minded.  Picture this: a cab driver drives along a street filled with tourists on foot.  In the noise and distraction the tourists aren't getting out of the cab's way quickly enough to suit its driver.   Instead of tooting the horn and rolling forward smoothly, he guns his engine and then accelerates into the gap he does have.  Not unexpectedly, the tourists are at least startled, if not frightened.  One responded by slapping the fender of the cab as it rushes by.  The truly Italian driver slams on his brakes, jumps out of his cab and charges into the group of eight tourists he just tried to run over, thus failing two consecutive IQ tests.  What possessed him to confront us when he was outnumbered eight-no-one? Cooler heads prevailed and he drove off cursing, but....


P.S. The Irascible Italian passes a real-life IQ test on his third try--Central Florense is a small town.  Two days later, we called for a couple of cabs for early the next morning to take the eight of us somewhere.  Imagine my surprise when the first driver to pull up was the irascible Italian himself.  Faced with the choice of accepting a profitable fare or recalling the tantrum s of several days prior, he wisely chose to.pretend he did not remember it at all. Passed that IQ test.

Raised On Amtrak

Raised on Amtrak

Raised on  Amtrak and the CTA, I don't think I have ever ridden  the rails faster than fifty or sixty [miles per hour, not kilometers].   But no more.  The electric sign at each end of each car provides a stream of information about next stops, special offers, the time, the speed at which we were traveling, and this  statement "this train is on time."   

Little wonder they can stay on schedule, our speed ranged from two to three hundred kilometers per hour.  in terms of miles per, that's 124 to 186.  Easy to make up time when you can dial up an extra fifty or sixty miles an hour.  

Although we rode those rails apace, we spent all day making the trip,  A cab ride to the station was followed by a quick lunch, standing, of course.  All the seats were occupied by people who were not eating. There are really no seats at the station for those who have to wait, so people take whatever seats are available.  This might  explain the pay toilets, but it does not, however, the missing toilet seats inside,  Unless people are thinking, "hey, I paid one Euro..."  They may have something there.  Way back in the 1960's, there were pay toilets at O'Hare Airport in Chicago.  The devices that collected the payment were manufactured by a company named "Nik~O~Lok, and the price was...yes, a nickel.  To raise the price to one Euro. is 2600 percent increase.   

Where was I?  Oh, yeah, it took all day and we were still looking  for a good pasta meal.  Our hotel's desk personnel recommended a place nearby, but we are still looking.

Things That Count

Things That Count

But enough about Venice, although it might just as well have been Venus at  times for all we knew about finding our way, enough....  You think I was kidding?  Let's talk counting. We are  with a woman who is wearing a device on her wrist that she connects to her iPad at night and it tells her how many steps she has taken that day.  In two days we took roughly twenty~five thousand 25,000 steps!  All those  steps and I think they were all taken in an area two or three city blocks square if we had been in Chicago.  All those blind alleys, dead~ends at canals, bridges to nowhere....

while I'm thinking numbers, I have a product idea.  converting Euros to dollars is too complicated for a window shopping wife,   so she just calls them "dollars."  So a fifteen Euro price tag becomes "fifteen dollars" instead of the twenty it actually calculates to.  Will somebody please invent a pair of eyeglasses that converts those prices in real time?

Mazeophobia In Venice

Mazeophobia In Venice

Getting around in any place new is awkward at best.  In Venice, it's frightening.  Even with a map,  nothing is straight and everything looks the same, even when what you are seeing IS the same--or you thought it was the last three times you wound up back in this same spot.

Then see what happens when it gets dark and you realize you didn't sleep at all the night because you were on a plane flying here in a coach seat you really could not recline because you knew the passenger behind you was also six feet tall and jammed into his own seat.

Now, I wouldn't be here writing this if we hadn't eventually found our way but come on, how does anyone find their way?  And don't tell me some satellite GPS system would take care of this.  I don't believe you. These alleys are four feet wide or less.  Your satellite can't see it.

I went looking for a term that describes what we were feeling as we pondered leaving our apartment this morning--it's known in psychological studies as mazeophobia--The irrational fear of becoming lost in a maze from which you never escape. But this
 seems so real. I for one don't think it's irrational at all....

On The Move,If You're Lucky

On The Move, If You're Lucky

´
Eventually, the glow you feel from all those x~rays you absorbed in the ever~changing world of passenger screening subsides.  You reach for your phone and notice a phone message from your airline ~your flight has been delayed  hour and fifteen minutes.  Your layover of just under 2 hours is now "estimated" to be 35 minutes.

Can you make it?  It depends.  From the 20th row, there are seventy people who must disembark  ahead of you.  You'll  lose ten to twelve minutes waiting for them to get out of your way.  Further, your departure time is just an estimate and is likely, as it was in our case, likely to be optimistic by fifteen minutes.  In short, all of your layover time is gone.  

But miracles do happen and they may delay departure of your international flight since twenty~five of the passengers on your flight are trying to make the same connection you are.  "We made it baby, it could happen to you."  NEXT: mazeophobia in Venice

On The Road Again

On The Road Again

What is it about driving down the road to someplace you've never been that isso attractive anyway?  Driving itself is mostly boring, especially on the long straight dull interstate that makes up two~thirds of the first leg  of  our  usual journey, followed by the airport.  

Next up, the ever~so~soothing process of lining up for inspection to be admitted to the waiting corridors that stretch for blocks  but back to that inspection  Open your bag, remove certain electronics and all liquids~oops I forgot, this is Atlanta on a Friday, so wait in line for forty~five minutes just to be inspected.  Now, will you be x~rayed?  Oh yes, we must ALL do that  and remove your belt  and any jacket or sweater you have on  Oh, and those shoes..  

Now stand  on the painted footprints and raise your arms [hoping your pants don't begin to fall].  The unfortunate among you will be directed aside and the inspector will have to rub the back of his hand over the suspicious spot or spots on your x~ray image  Luckier still?  you can have your hand swabbed and watch while the cloth used to swab your hands is moved with tongs  to a machine "sniffing" for traces of bomb~making materials  Hope you didn't spread fertilizer in your yard recently.  

Where was I?  Oh yes, your bag might have contained suspicious metal objects, so now after you retrieve your shoes~hard to forget those~and the contents of your pockets, like your wallet, spare change and  your cellphone;you get to watch them remove the offending object object or objects from your carry on ["are there any sharp objects in here that might injure me?"  I wish, you think but don't say].  Then they inspect the entire bag.     The suspicious objects, and your bag,of course, are re~x~rayed.  

Now your bag is wiped with another damp piece of cloth and "sniffed" by that machine looking  for traces of bomb~making materials.  Let's hope that's not your old briefcase from when you  used to work for a chemical manufacturer, but you pass, put your shoes  and belt back on and,glowing with radiation, you head for the gate to begin the wait.  

Being the reflective sort you pause to wonder why they don't call it "the waiting room" and not the "terminal.'  Ah, but mixing "terminal' with "waiting room" only brings on....   Are we having fun yet?  Wait a minute, where did I leave my cellphone?  

Why I'm Still Driving

Why I'm Still Driving

Some would say driving here is not for the faint of heart.  It's a resort community, so there are always visitors hunting for clues that might lead them to their destinations.  Worse yet, it's a retirement community.  Many who visited regularly with their families when they were young, returned to live full time where they so enjoyed visiting for too short a time in years past.

Not content to leave a difficult situation alone, the city fathers, or perhaps the developers--embarrassed at the environmental damage that massive migration here by both of he groups mentioned above simply had to cause--sought to maintain the appearance of the island's unspoiled appeal.  They created rules that limited the size and location of signs, restricted the outdoor lighting, forbade the cutting of trees without a permit--not just cutting down trees, but the mere trimming of a tree or trees.  Now, think about that for a minute.  Tourists driving onto the island in the dark, after driving for eight to fifteen hours to get here, now have to find their way without the benefit of a visible sign, or a well-lit, broad avenue.  Think also of the senior citizens, no longer confident in their night time eyesight, driving slowly down the road headed for home.

Now add to that the fact that the leading cause of fatal accidents is not speed, nor is it driving while intoxicated, or even road rage.  It is, quite simply, distracted driving, not paying attention to where they are going.  It's true.  How is that scenario of the arriving visitor fitting that profile?  From "when are we gonna get there, Daddy," to "I really have to go," to "where is that blasted sign?" to "you just missed it, you were supposed to turn right there!"  Driven to distraction, impaired by fatigue and eyestrain, it's a wonder they make it at all.  Then there are the seniors, ambling along at thirty in a forty-five zone, in the left lane of course.  Must have been gabbing with their passengers, or telling a story they could still picture at this very moment, otherwise, how do you explain the sudden right turn from the left lane?  Did you know also that senior citizens and teenagers are the two most dangerous age-groups behind the wheel?

Here, we have a median age nearly twice that of the nation, and we have more than two million visitors each year.  Why aren't we all dying off in car accidents, or at least driven crazy by the act of driving?  I think it's "adaptation."  Local drivers have developed the ability to shrug it off, to notice the out-of-state tags and be wary of their next move.  Who knows when his wife (or her husband) will yell, "There's your turn, right there!" and the startled driver will turn without warning from the opposite lane, or cut you off as you approach the intersection and he turns left in front of
us.

We've learned to nod and smile in disbelief when the geezer in front of them rolls along at thirty in the left lane.  If we are lucky, he will slow down, move into the right lane a few blocks before his turn, and leave his turn signal on for several blocks.  He will tap the brakes at each driveway or street in case it's the one where he has to turn.  Then, when he gets to his turn, he stomps on the brakes in the traffic lane, nearly coming to a full stop in the traffic lane before making his right turn.  Or, while rolling along in the left lane, he will notice his turn is right here--and he'll cut straight across without applying his brakes at all, proving he can turn at thirty just as well as at five miles per hour.

When locals get together, they will tell about the latest crazy move someone made in the road recently.  By developing this penchant for gathering our "I can top that"stories, we have improved our awareness of the drivers around us, and we are better for it.  We are not distracted, we are focused on defensive driving.  We learn to anticipate and be prepared for even the craziest of moves, like the driver coming out of a two-lane street that is divided by a parkway of grass and shrubs who has failed to notice he was supposed to cross that parkway before turning and is now driving the wrong way on a one way street, and wait until you see what they will do to extricate themselves from that situation!

But, back to my personal situation.  I have, in the past eleven years, developed that sense of defensive anticipation more keenly than most people driving in "normal" cities and towns.  Even as I pass Paul McCartney's long ago measuring stick for being really old--a new stanza has been added  to the lyrics--

and when I'm so old, just barely alive, 

will you still keep on letting me drive?  

will you still trust me, 

sure you won't bust me 

when I'm sixty-four?   

I'm still out there driving, and sooner or later, people will be shaking their heads at how I drive.  But I'm thinking most of them are conditioned to look out for geezers like me.  As long as I don't leave the island, I think I'll be able to drive while staying alive.

Mental Floss

Mental Floss

It came to me as I was flossing my teeth this morning.  Yes, I floss my teeth every morning.  It's one of those healthy things that I kept doing long enough that it became a habit.   If I fail to do it, it haunts me the rest of the day, really.  This can be awkward at certain times as I have good-sized hands and a smallish mouth (this is the  physical quality of space within the cheeks and behind the lips, so to speak, not what some might perceive as a too large quantity of words that emanate therefrom).  But back to the observation that came along.  I had my hands halfway in my mouth and some floss pulled down between the last couple of molars back there, and I could not get my hands to move the floss any way at all.  I stood there a moment then managed to move my hands out of my mouth and started over at the other end of my mouth.  Everything worked fine after that, not so remarkable, but it set me to thinking, probably somewhat earlier than I should have.

One of the opportunities I have been afforded in this life (thank you, Kaitlen--things the old Jim might characterize as weaknesses and/or defects are really just opportunities) is dealing with the disruption of the messaging system between my brain and my muscles.  As it's been described to me, nerves are just telegraph lines (Oh, come on Jim--this is the 21st century, call them fiber optic cables for the analogy, for heaven's sake!)....  OK, the nerves are just a sort of network of fiber optic cables that carry messages from the brain to the muscles, mostly without conscious thought.   You might decide to get out of bed, for example, and once your brain has received that message, the part of the brain that governs unconscious movement sends hundreds, maybe thousands of signals to get your hand to grasp the sheet and or blanket, to begin pulling it off your upper body, telling each of your legs to slide up toward your upper body, and your toes to search for the open space to escape from the covers, telling your hips to turn in the direction of the open side of the bed, telling your hands to help raise your head and shoulder off the mattress, while telling your legs to move still further to find the edge of the mattress, and pushing your trunk upright, then executing a swivel in the direction of that open side of the bed, then dropping one leg at a time down off the edge of the bed, while trying to sense the approaching floor so they don't just crash to the floor, and so on and so on....  Each of those movements required hundreds of messages to be sent from the brain to the muscles and from the muscle to the brain.  Probably the only thought you had was, "I've got to get up."  Your brain unconsciously does the rest.

Well, the chemicals that carry these messages have to come from somewhere, don't they?  So, your brain has a place that manufactures those chemicals (in this case, dopamine).  Mine slowed way down, and only provides a trickle of them around for my brain to use.  At the same time, there has to be a receptor in each of your muscles to receive and translate those messages into making the muscles move.  These receptors have to work harder to sense that trickle of dopamine (sort of like straining to hear something, I'd guess).  As a result, the receptors wear out prematurely.  They can be replaced, but your brain and nervous system only create new ones when demand is created by vigorous activity.   Hence, it is important for people like me to exercise vigorously on a daily basis and vary the kinds of activity we engage in so that new receptors are activated and fresh, new connections are made.  If you run into something that won't move when you want it to, you try doing it slightly differently or more consciously, since the conscious movements are controlled by another part of the brain.  (Whew! That part's over.  I don't think my neurologist would grant me this much poetic license to describe this condition, but what she doesn't know won't hurt her in this case).

In any event, it occurred to me that our citizenry ( or society, country, species, life form--whatever collective term you might choose to apply), might just benefit from a similar approach.  If one approach doesn't convey the message the way we intended it, try another way.  Don't just repeat the same slogan until it becomes meaningless (what does the mantra, "no new taxes" mean anyway?  No new ones at all, or just increases in licensing fees instead?  And do we really want "universal health care" whatever the cost?)  Secondly, why not have each part of the body politic try some vigorous exercise, as in thoughtful debate on a regular basis, instead of repeatedly sending the same slogans to the worn out ears (receptors) of the rest of us.  Maybe all that activity could cause some new receptors to activate and get some things moving.  OK, it was before I had my morning coffee, but there it is.          

Where's That Bollywood Ending Dance Number for The 100 Foot Journey?

Where's That Bollywood Ending Dance Number for The 100 Foot Journey?

Imagine my dismay when the The 100 Foot Journey ended without a Bollywood Ending Dance number.  While it was no musical, the film should have had a true dance number with the whole cast, the street market extras, and anyone else that could learn those standard dance moves that ended all those Bollywood Movies.  The first time I remember seeing one was in the India-based Oscar winner, Slumdog Millionaire.  It was filmed at the train station with the cast dancing on the wide concrete platform.  Slumdog Millionaire was no Bollywood film, but it paid tribute to its cultural roots with the big dance.

The 100 Foot Journey depicted members of two distinctly different cultures (one of them Indian) crossing a cultural divide.  Further, it even contained plenty of striking music in its score, and a scene where two of the central characters (Helen Mirren and Om Puri) actually dance alone in the home/restaurant of Ms. Mirren’s character.  Surely that was enough.  Oh, I know the traditional Bollywood movie was a musical, with the music and dance woven inextricably into its plot, but at least give us the ending in the credits! (and, yes, I spelled inextricably right in my first attempt).

I guess I was just expecting it after recently seeing The Jersey Boys” put on a spectacular (by American standards, anyway) Bollywood Dance Number to end it.   I make the reference to “American standards” intentionally.  While I am sure the whole cast of The Jersey Boys took part, a Bollywood Ending Dance would contain hundreds, if not thousands of dancers.  Why did I become such an ending-dance fan?  Just go take a look at Slumdog Millionaire’s ending number, I found that one pretty quickly, and I’m still looking at Google and YouTube for The Jersey Boys.  (But I'm still mad about The 100 Foot Journey, not even one dance step, much less a hundred.)

P.S., Yeah, I know it's been a while, I kinda lost my bearings for a time, but I'm coming back.

EWOC Press Release

EWOC Press Release

Wednesday, it was reported that the Equal Weather Opportunity Commission has confirmed receipt of a complaint from a resident of Western Michigan.  The complaint alleges weather discrimination.  A spokesperson was quoted as saying, “All American citizens are, under the law, entitled to equal weather, free from discrimination.  Obviously, this means that rain, snow, sleet or freezing rain must fall equally upon all citizens, regardless of street, neighborhood or geographical location.”   The complaint alleges excessive amounts of rain have fallen there (the name of the actual location, Saugatuck, is being withheld, pending notification of relatives). 

The National Weather Service will be investigating.  The respondents, TV Chief Meteorologists LLF, have pointed out that equal proportions of rain and sunshine probabilities were forecast, and that they cannot be held responsible for the disparate impact of the actual weather.  In fact, they intend to provide evidence that their forecasts have a 0.0001 correlation with the actual climatic events, including rain, wind, hail, snow or freezing rain. 

The defendants are quoted as saying, when notified of the complaint, “Days may be cloudy or sunny, we’re in or we’re out of the money, we're all innocent, come rain or come shine.”