Saying farewell

Ok, we are in the last few hours.  Shortly, that generous, supportive, merry month of November will shortly be gone! We won't see it for a year and even then it will be attached to a new set of 12 months.  

We only have this moment, this month now.  It will never, ever come again.  We are only here at this moment now, right now.  Have a drink!  Give a kiss!  Parting with these moments is such strong, unyielding, final sorrow.  I guess we will see the likes of such a month again.  Christmas is coming, after all.  Champion seasons are ahead and love will blossom strongly again.  So, bye, November!

What I write about

I write this blog to record experiences and ideas I have.  I have found repeatedly that thinking about my life, internal and external, gives me insight into my aging, my friendships and my thoughts.  I have been impressed by the list of variables that Robert Ornstein made that tend to explain what gets noticed and remembered.  What is noticed, what I am aware of is a big part of knowing me, my mind and my life. Ornstein's list 

https://fearfunandfiloz.blogspot.com/2009/06/our-minds-and-reality.html

1. Recency – did it just happen?

2. Vividness – Is it exciting? Colorful? 'Real'?

3. Comparison – Was it bigger, smaller, faster, slower than usual?

4. Significance – What did it 'mean'?  Was it 'good'?  'Bad'?

tends to apply to watching a baseball game or people at a party.  In today's world, there are many other sources of suggestions for subjects to think about.  

Many of my daily emails come from Amazon book titles that are advertised.  I read CNN's Five Things, which does contain five things that are prominent in the day's news but also include tidbits of interest or are funny.  Friends may make a written or spoken comment that gets my head off in a direction I wouldn't have gone without them.  For instance, today is the birthday of C.S. Lewis, an author who wrote several books that meant much to me as a young adult.  So, history, including my own history can suggest associations that get my head going.  Meditation and the resulting awareness of my mind, along with attempts to let myself face all my fears, desires, regrets and other emotions suggest avenues of thought worth pursuing.  The title of this blog is purposely aimed at reminding me of the breadth and length of thoughts and interests.  I think that animals like humans tend to be alert to fear and sources of danger but when there is no pressing danger, fun and pleasures come to mind.  And then, taking thought about thoughts, feelings, plans and memories naturally take place.  

I find that my blog, which goes back to 2008, and quite valuablely has a search window that quickly finds all posts containing a given search term, is quite a help.

Woe

The notes about people, often born on that day years ago, in the Writer's Almanac can be quite eye-opening.  When I was growing up, it seemed to me that the teams from my community and my school often lost their games. That didn't upset me much but I felt that losing was understandable and part of life.  I appreciated this quote about and from Charles Schulz, creator of the comic strip Peanuts that appeared in the Almanac a few days ago.

Schulz was unpopular in school, and one of his cartoons was rejected from his high school yearbook. "I was a bland, stupid-looking kid who started off bad and failed everything and hated the whole time," he recalls. He once received a C- in an art class unit on drawing children. He flunked plenty of other classes, he remembers, and "I even flunked dating, which was understandable, because who'd have gone out with me?"

Does that statement ring with masculine pride, confidence and certainty?  No.  I think it is refreshing in this country to read something that is not braggadocio, not proud and chest-expanding.  It does not reek of sweat and victory and standing on the dead body of the enemy.  Life and beauty are much more than blind pride and certainty.

There are 50 pages of his books on Amazon. Not to slight The Gospel According to Peanuts by Robert Short, a book illustrating Christian ideas from the Peanuts comic strips.

It doesn't take long

Ever since I was a 4th grader, I have been interested in photography. A few months ago, CNN's weekday news report called "Five Things" supplied a link to professional news photos of recent events.  Since then, I have enjoyed looking at "The Week in 40 Photos".

https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=The+Week+in+40+photos&ia=web

I haven't found a good date-ordered list of the CNN collections and it looks like the same or similar title is being used by other organizations for their collection of photos.  

I imagine a prize-winning photo can make a big difference for a photographer. This shot is from the CNN collection of August 6, 2021. It can take a while to see what this shows.  This picture was taken by photographer Jewel Samad.  Runner #8 won by .01 second.

We know what a difference the photo of an officer kneeling on the neck of a man in handcuffs has made and continues to make.  Quick snapping of a scene or slow careful arrangement, with or without light adjustment  and other photo editing tools, can make an enormous difference.  

I have lived for just about 30,000 days and I am sure that every one of them contained beautiful moments, surprising moments, tender and tearful moments, some wonderful and some yucky.  

Overpowering sequence

It is time for me to draw a halt, or at least a pause, in buying books.  I don't know how many times the Amazon computer has had to inform me that the book I was trying to buy is one I already own. Getting more and more books "of interest" doesn't make sense.  Amazon makes a good file of Kindle books in my library, including when I bought them.  

I can't always remember every book I have, not even every book I have read.  Ok, not even every book I have read in the last year.  C.S. Lewis was a professor of literature and in his "An Experiment in Criticism", he pictures a woman in front of a shelf of books trying to remember if she has read the book in her hands or not.  In my class of graduate teachers, I encouraged them to think back over a list of titles, find one that has escaped their mind or one that they remember fondly and try reading it again.  Sometimes, an old favorite shows merit and power again and sometimes it really does not, now that the reader has grown older, more experienced and more sophisticated.  

Looking over books bought more than 10 years ago but not titles I recognize, I saw "Time Paradox" by Phillip Zimbardo.  I knew the name from reading about his prison experiment but didn't remember having even opened the Time book once. I downloaded it to my Kindle and started in.  The information about the book and the man included information about a popular, highly rated tv production called Discovering Psychology.  I found the series on a website and watched some of the first episode.  I really enjoyed the two sections about middle school girls and middle school boys being introduced to very attractive teachers.

https://www.learner.org/series/discovering-psychology/past-present-and-promise/

The part I am mentioning runs on the tape from about 5:20 to 9:27

Let us give thanks

Thanks for a good friend.  Thanks for a good time.

Not to forget the negatives: thanks for the flat tire we didn't get, thanks for not accepting that scam, thanks we didn't get hurt that time we fell.

Thanks for a good rest, for that book and that movie.  

Thanks for all the good we didn't notice or don't understand.

Thanks for beauty, thanks for warmth, thanks for love.

Conscious minds

Anil Seth has a TED talk about how minds come to be and work.  He also has a book called "Being You."  It looks to him that our conscious minds have two basic properties: information and integration.  The words may not sound like it but they mean something along the lines of unpredictable and "of a whole", not scattered or random.  Between what I read and what I watch, I feel like I see the sort of properties he means in some works of fiction or in print.  

It is natural and basic for creators to try to be impressive, notable, memorable.  So, why not do something quite different?  Howaboutlosingthespacebetweenwordsandsomeothercustomsofwritinglikecapitalletters?  Yes, it looks different but is it taken as a bother instead of a fun innovation?  Since the development of photography, artists of various kinds have asked what is a drawing or a painting trying to do that a photograph couldn't do or wouldn't do.  Standing out by being unusual needs to be done with care and imagination: something a bit different but not TOO different.  

What about integration?  Think of some bit of UNITY, some clinging together, usually around a purpose, at least around a theme.  Without some coherence, we just have random colors, sounds, a big mess. We need something we don't already know and we need that something to show an integration, a whole.

How to communicate disdain

Two dogs live across the street.   The older one seems to specialize in disdainfully looking away.  I realized today that to pull it off properly, it is important to catch the target's eye.  The target should be able to tell you are looking at him, her or it.  If you are optically agile enough, it can add to the force of the look if you can roll your eyes while turning your head away from the target and letting eyes come to rest at least 90° away from the target.  If successfully executed, the maneuver can be completed in quiet.  No barking, no yipping, no laughing or snickering or sighing are needed.

We have been watching with interest the ridiculous Netflix show Jane, the Virgin.  It is a rapidly changing story of very interwoven characters who are dating each other, hating each other, loving each other and deeply lusting for each other.  The story is an American adaptation of a Venezuelan hit Juanna, la virgen.

The audience is steadily learning that the luxury hotel manager, a total male dish, of course, is the ex-husband of her and the brother of him and the son of none other than him over there.  Things usually get even more complicated when we find that the male dish is the ex-husband of her.  During his husband period, he had an affair with her, yes, the lovely daughter of the chief of police, who never did like that guy.  There are usually as many characters showing disdain and displeasure as there are positive waves so we get many chances to see versions of disdain, distrust and deception, and the masterly look away.  A viewer can get lost in the ups and downs, enough so that there is a summary of the story and the tensions that are zipping back and forth at the beginning of each episode.  The summary doesn't help much.

Nearly did it again

I walked the neighborhood this morning and it was cold, less than 20° F with a chill wind.  I wore gloves that I thought would be warm enough but they weren't.  My hands got cold enough that I went to Amazon when I got back and looked up warm gloves.  I read the comments, especially the negative ones.  One pair reminded me of a pair I was pretty sure I had in the closet.  We have three good-sized cardboard boxes of gloves and scarves and winter stuff, mostly gloves.  

I found I have two pairs that are still attached together, never been worn.  I know this is characteristic of me.

I don't think I am a spendthrift, at least not in the sense that I throw money around for pleasure.  But I often find that I go to the store and buy things I don't need and already have at home.  Mostly, it is supplies, especially food, but it can be anything.  I rarely think to check what we have.  I think of what I want and I go and buy it.  Reminds me of our family trip out West in the 70"s.  We camped much of the way with our two teen daughters.  Each afternoon, we would drive up to a market somewhere and as we got out of the car, I would imagine a food that seemed, in my mind, a pleasant thing to eat that evening.  I would say something like "let's get some ham" and I would immediately be at odds with the woman I am married to.  She repeatedly took the position that it was unwise and uneconomical to decide beforehand on something to buy.  She advocated looking around, seeing what was available and what was on sale and, only then, deciding what to buy.

I guess it is the habit of buying without looking at what I have first that has led to the thousands of Kindle books I have.  A successful download of a Kindle book results in Amazon not downloading another book.  When I mistakenly try to get a book I have already, I get a notice that I bought that book already.  I am often pleased that I had good enough taste to buy such a worthy book before.  Similarly, we have developed a supply of backups after I have bought a second box of cereal without realizing that we already have one waiting to be used.  

Look on the bright side of life!

https://religionnews.com/2021/11/15/think-were-living-through-the-apocalypse-so-did-first-century-christians

Every now and then, I find myself thinking about a theme and then seeing that theme pop up in the articles that the GetPocket service in the Firefox browser suggests might be of interest.  In 1972, the book The Limits to Growth was published.  I read through it and found the Club of Rome and some MIT scientists and thinkers, using ideas and computer models, predicted trouble about the year 2025.  The basic trouble was threats to human life and comfort and survival.  The words "climate change" were not much in vogue at that time but my friend and I wondered about what the book predicted.  He is a historian of science and asked what the history of the future looked like.  History of the future?  He meant the scorecard of predictions.  In the long run, have predictions of the future been what happened?

That conversation led to our creating a course called "Futures".  It was an attempt to have interested students think about the future: theirs, everybody's, whatever angle interested them. What I have been thinking about writing is that the experience of teaching showed me how wrong predictions have been.  

The link at the top goes to an article in Religious News Services written by Monsignor Thomas Reese.  He basically says what I would say: Don't count us out yet.  Msgr. Reese makes a lovely title that encapsulates the main idea:

Think you are in the End Times? - So did 1st Century Christians

He quotes Jesus in Matthew 24:36 that nobody knows the hour or day of the end.

Humans are sensitive to possible danger and quick to deduce from the news or the temperature outside that "This is It!"  This relates to my favorite movie, The Russians Are Coming! The Russians Are Coming!.  I recommend the story and the movie.  It's bad judgment, curiosity and pride but yet, a Russian spy sub is hung up on a sandbar off Maine.  The captain orders a few of his men to go ashore, "borrow" a powerful boat and let him use it to free the sub.  The sailors are very, very scared.  They know they are in danger.  

Just as it is hard to be aging and approaching death and still not knowing when the time of life will be over, it is hard to face dangers and difficulties and still appreciate the good things all around.  But try and keep on trying!

What day of the week is it?

Jill Lepore is a member of the Harvard history faculty and also a writer for the New Yorker.  She has an article in the current issue about the history of the week.  

I find the week a subject of interest.  As Prof. Lepore mentions, days and years have rather natural markers of light and seasons but weeks are more arbitrary.   Lepore cites various attempts to create better weeks with more or less days in them but they haven't really taken off.  Personally, I think the nature of my days of the week matter more often to my life than months or years or maybe even seasons.  

Years ago, I was introduced to the book "Waiting for the Weekend" by the architect Witold Rybczynski.  He has other books and I don't usually read much about architecture but some of the interesting points about weeks and days of the week and their nature are mentioned in that book as well as in Lepore's article.  The names we use are related to Norse gods and goddesses, like Woden and Thor.  The Hebrew Bible does say that God rested on the 7th day and that passage has probably had some influence on what happens on what day.  There is also the matter of the Sabbath and a holy day of the week, on which work was to be avoided to create a day of rest and holy thought.  The actual day of special attention to life and holy matters is different from ours in some cultures.

The use of Rybczynski's term, "weekend", is especially related to the work days and days of non-working.  I have seen comments in British writing that imply the word and the concept are especially American.  When thinking about the week, the subject of modern industrialization comes up. Farming, especially work on fields of plants, naturally relates to sunrise and sunset, time when one can see better.  Industry tends to modify the day into one that begins at a given hour on the clock, when the factory whistle blows or the school day begins.  Of course, that idea relates to having a clock, whatever that is, and being able to use it.   

My life tends to be strongly related to the day of the week.  I know the names of the days and I can recite them in the order used.  You might think that I could not be confused as to whether today is Saturday or the day before that or the day after.  When I was a kid, I knew I could look at the first page of the newspaper to figure out which day I was in.  Now, my paper, my computer, my cellphone, my smartphone, …… all tell me.  I tend to spend time on the web page of Time.gov but I can't seem to find the day of the week or the date there.

240 Years

We have known these three for 64 years, most of our lives.  Take a look at "Women, After All" by Melvin Konner.  Give a little thought to how you got here.  You may be able to see that these women represent wisdom, love and energy.  All sorts, too many kinds to list and comprehend.  Since they are 80 years old, they represent 240 years of lively, intelligent, appreciative life.  

Take a moment to think of what 240 years means.  240 years ago, the US constitution had not been ratified yet.  It was the year 1781.   Household electricity wasn't available.  Roads and cars we use all the time weren't available.  Of course, these women don't reach back that far but they do represent rich life, more than we can know in detail.  

With writing, memory, photography, videography, we are slowly getting better at bridging the years and appreciating the treasures in them.  Maybe you have heard of the book "Extra Life" by Steven Johnson or seen the PBS video.  There is much awareness of the cost of speech and communication to stir hatred and malice but paying respects, touching base and saying Hello can do a great deal to enrich life and remind us of what we have achieved.

Device life strife

I steadily advocate using a computer for various internet tasks.  55% of internet traffic is by smartphone.  Smartphones are good and convenient.  I finally got one myself.  But computers are more powerful.  If you can use one and you do, you can limit your device screen time and do what you want more easily. 

If you have a Chromebook, a Windows machine, a Mac, an iPad, a smartphone, a Kindle, another Kindle and older Chromebook that no longer qualifies for updates, you can spend the last hour of every day checking to see which devices need to be re-charged overnight.  You have probably read that it is better for battery life of many devices to let them run down to close to empty before charging them up.  Battery technology, like many other aspects of today's electronics, changes and different batteries advocate different practices.  

Things can get more complicated when some devices age or no longer qualify for official updates.  At that point, you may want to dispose of them or give them to relatives or friends that can make use of them.  It is sometimes a bit of a question as to whether giving older devices away is a help to people or a hindrance.  Theoretically, newer devices are better designed and more up-to-date with current technology.  Of course, some changes are not all that important and a few may be actually worse than older versions.  

The very use of the word "devices" reminds us that much of today's stuff didn't exist a few years back.  I haven't mentioned "IoT"( the internet of things) such as a smart vacuum cleaner or a smartwatch.  There is a  possibility of devices that need to be recharged but that perform such different tasks that we don't even know what to call them.  And between our car, our kitchen, our outside grounds and our desks, we simply forget the drone that needs to be charged or the security camera in the dog's collar.  And don't forget to check your Kobo reader and that Nook. And what about the backyard trail camera?

Complexitarianism

I am thinking of founding a new religion.  The idea is not really to help solve problems, but just to offer an explanation for what goes on.  I have mentioned the book by David Eagleman called "Incognito" and the shorter related book by Lisa Feldman Barrett called "Seven and a Half Lessons about the Brain".  These books are clear about limitations of our minds and human ability to think.  

You probably realize that the world is complicated.  How complicated?  Here are some comparisons.  If you have lived to be 80 years old, you have lived 2,522,880,000 seconds.  You lived them, they were your seconds, but how many can you remember?  How many elementary particles are there?  10 to the 80th power, 10 with eighty zeros behind it.  We often hear how complex the brain is.  It has many cells but for big numbers, we often read about the number of connections there are between the neurons.  Let's say 10 to the 15th power.  My favorite book about probability, "The Improbability Principle" by David Hand, says the number of subsets of humans who might be on the internet at once is 10 to 750 billionth power.  This is the world we live in.  It includes the internet that you use to read this blog.  

So, if you are looking for some feeling of security and clarity about all the stuff that goes on, in you, on you, with you, with your friends and the others on this planet, maybe it will help to boil it all down to "It's complicated".  Feelings and impulses, memories and urges, deals and delights and sorrows -they are complicated.  They are immense and intricate. Lots of them are changing right now and many are unknown.  Our ancestors, way back, the slime and the creatures and the primitive life, all the way to here and now, didn't have it all figured out and neither do we.  Just salute the complexity of it all and enjoy the good stuff.

Fwd: Latest from Food Politics: The American Heart Association's new and groundbreaking dietary guidelines

Food matters, diet matters, nutrition matters.  Bill

---------- Forwarded message ---------
From: Marion Nestle <feedblitz@mail.feedblitz.com>
Date: Tue, Nov 16, 2021 at 9:37 AM
Subject: Latest from Food Politics: The American Heart Association's new and groundbreaking dietary guidelines

The American Heart Association (AHA) has just issued its latest set of dietary guidelines aimed at preventing the leading cause of death in the United States: 2021 Dietary Guidance to Improve Cardiovascular Health: A Scientific Statement From the ...

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by Marion Nestle   November 16 2021 The American Heart Association's new and groundbreaking dietary guidelines The American Heart Association (AHA) has just issued its latest set of dietary guidelines aimed at preventing the leading cause of death in the United States: 2021 Dietary Guidance to Improve Cardiovascular Health: A Scientific Statement From the American Heart Association. Because AHA guidelines apply not only to coronary heart disease but also to all other chronic disease conditions—and sustainability issues—influenced by dietary practices, they deserve special attention. Most of these repeat and reinforce the 2020-2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans. The two big differences in the recommendations: Clarifying protein recommendations: these include all sources but emphasize plant sources (#4) Including a new one: minimize ultra-processed foods (#6) These recommendations are way ahead of the US Dietary Guidelines in recognizing how much ultra-processed foods contribute to poor health, and how important it is to minimize their intake. Also unlike the US guidelines, these are unambiguous and easily summarized.   The statement is worth reading for its emphasis on two other points. This dietary pattern addresses problems caused by other chronic conditions and also has a low environmental impact. Following this dietary pattern requires much more than personal responsibility for food choices.  It requires societal changes as well. The press release summarizes the problems in society that make following healthy diets so difficult, if not impossible: Widespread dietary misinformation from the Internet; A lack of nutrition education in grade schools and medical schools; Food and nutrition insecurity – According to references cited in the statement, an estimated 37 million Americans had limited or unstable access to safe and nutritious foods in 2020; Structural racism and neighborhood segregation, whereby many communities with a higher proportion of racial and ethnic diversity have few grocery stores but many fast-food outlets; and Targeted marketing of unhealthy foods and beverages to people from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds through tailored advertising efforts and sponsorship of events and organizations in those communities. As the statement concludes: "Creating an environment that facilitates, rather than impedes, adherence to heart-healthy dietary patterns among all individuals is a public health imperative." Amen to that. Comment: From my perspective, this statement thoroughly supersedes the 2020-2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, which—because they say nothing about ultra-processed foods , differential protein sources, sustainability, or doing anything to counter societal determinants of poor diets—were out of date the instant they appeared. Some of the details of the AHA statement will be debated but its overall approach should not be. The committee that put these guidelines together deserves much praise for basing its advice on today's research and most pressing societal needs. Additional AHA Resources: Spanish news release  Available multimedia is on right column of release link: https://newsroom.heart.org/news/new-look-at-nutrition-research-identifies-10-features-of-a-heart-healthy-eating-pattern?preview=288ef57763869cab946e725d341dbb63 After Nov. 2, 2021, view the manuscript online. What kind of diet helps heart health? Eating walnuts daily lowered bad cholesterol and may reduce cardiovascular disease risk Eating more plant foods may lower heart disease risk in young adults, older women Sugar 101 Follow AHA/ASA news on Twitter @HeartNews The post The American Heart Association's new and groundbreaking dietary guidelines appeared first on Food Politics by Marion Nestle.   • Email to a friend • More from Food Politics Industry-funded study of the week: would you believe baobab? Weekend reading: Food and Inequality Food prices are going up. Oh, the irony. This message was sent to olderkirby@gmail.com. Manage your subscription here. Marion Nestle, Department of Nutrition and Food Studies, NYU, 411 Lafayette, 5th Floor, New York, NY 10003-7035, United States Safely Unsubscribe • Archives • Preferences • Contact • Subscribe • Privacy

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I might be the cause

If you get unexplained emails every now and then stating that you have an ebook gift, I might be the cause.  You can send me an email and ask if the title mentioned was sent by me.  Amazon web page coders have improved their page that lists egifts sent, both those accepted and those hanging, awaiting acceptance.  I have given nearly 1000 such gifts and about 1 in seven has not been accepted.

I don't usually check with the person I am sending a gift ebook as to whether they want the book.  I don't ask if they have the book already.  I don't ask if they know what an ebook is or have any experience with ebooks.  If there is some likelihood that the book is fairly inexpensive and that the book will fit the interests that the recipient has mentioned, I may pay for the book and Amazon sends them a notice.  Unless they accept the book, the gift hangs in limbo.  I think the record for a hanging, potential gift is 7 years.  The person I sent it to died so they aren't around to accept it.  

Of course, if you get an offer for a free ebook, you might not want such a book in your possession.  The contents might be offensive.  Maybe you have tried ebooks and find that you dislike using them.  Quite a few of my friends say they prefer "real books", by which they mean traditionally made books of paper.  I find lower prices are often available for an ebook than for a traditional paper book.  The fact that the
storage of such books takes up no shelf space, and gathers no dust,
that the book is easily transported,
can arrive through the air without any sort of connection,
and that the Kindle software combines highlighted passages (made with a fingertip, which is easily available) into a single file that comes in email -
all these factors make ebooks very useful.

I prefer the actual Kindle reader for personal ebook reading but the app to receive and read them is available for smartphones, iPads and other tablets and computers.  You can start reading an ebook on a smartphone, open the same book to where you left off on a computer and continue reading when you have time and interest.

Bad mood waning

I'm in a bad mood but good stuff keeps happening to spoil it.  The bad mood stems from back pain that was created in some mysterious not-understood way.  This sort of thing has happened many times before.  The best medicine has been a heating pad but a tennis ball between my back and the wall, with me scooching up and down and Lynn's oddly bent massage cane help, too.  I've spent the whole morning in a recliner with the pad but I haven't eliminated the bother yet.  It is often a matter of time, an unknown amount of time.  It is a good time for me to observe my habitual impatience.

This morning, I received CNN's report "Five Things" and the first item was about a library that lends people instead of books. It told of a transgender woman and a conservative Christian woman meeting at the Christian's request.  She was cautious and guarded at first but reported that the meeting was extremely valuable and fun.  That and yesterday's celebration of my birthday with my family had already pushed me toward celebrating my blessings and good fortune.  The family of four branches usually sings "Happy Birthday" and then the celebrant blows out candles.  Lynn had just a single candle for me, to, you know, cut down on air pollution and all.  I did manage to blow it completely out with one puff.

During the night, we had our first snowfall, considerably later in the season than usual:

 

What does that mean?

In college, I read Jacques Barzun with interest.  He grew up in France in an upper class family.  Later he became a dean at Columbia University.  Somewhere, I think, in his "Science: The Glorious Entertainment", he discusses vocabulary.  He uses as an example the word "plastic", which once meant "flexible", malleable but in the era of chemistry and invention, many objects that are called "plastic" are rigid and inflexible.  So, Barzun said, we have a word that means something and the opposite of that something.  

Yesterday's Blondie comic has Dagwood saying he doesn't want to sound like a broken record.  His teen son asks his teen older sister what is a broken record.  She admits that she isn't sure but thinks it is what her father's generation calls "vinyl".  While reading about Google's data handling, I came across an article that says the company does not "sell" data but may "share" or "monetize" it.  I have enjoyed writings and recordings of Prof. John McWhorter, a linguist at Columbia who emphasizes that language and word meanings are always changing.  I find using Duckduckgo to find information about the use of terms a fun and useful habit.  

From Bazun on, there seems to be several sources of steady pressure on vocabulary.  If I am accused of a crime, my lawyer may explain that my action does not actually fit the definition of the crime.  If I am selling a new or modified product, my marketing team may come with a new spelling or a modified use of a term already in use.  When a physicist finds a new particule, he needs a name for it.  Back in high school, I read a semanticist's recommendation that words with multiple meanings and definitions have subscripts3 to point to meanings.  

I have little interest or ability to be "cool", withit or a model, but I am interested in the meaning of words I encounter.  I have found that microscopic life and modern music groups are often the source of words I have never seen before.  I just tried "Purple Guts" to see if there was a famous popular music group by that name.  Evidently not, but there seems to be an album by that name.  I am warned that it employs "explicit lyrics". 

Don't Google it - use Duckduckgo

My friends explained that Google sells search info to businesses trying to get my business.  They advise using Duckduckgo and other search engines that don't sell search infor.  Since we are getting more robocalls and already suffer from too much unwanted, unrequested email, I am advising the use of Firefox browser.  I further advise going into Firefox settings and setting the default browser to Duckduckgo.

I do realize that with Covid and supply chain issues and related disturbances, a small business, or a large one for that matter, would like very much to find customers.

Getting to read that book

If you hear about a book that sounds interesting, there are several possibilities.  I am a fan of Amazon Kindle, an e-reader.  Amazon's Kindle books can be read on a computer, a tablet like an iPad and a smartphone, as well as on the Kindle reader itself.  Having one or more of those options available increases the chance you can get the book inexpensively and read it.  If you look the book up on the Amazon web site, you may find that it is not available in electronic format (as an "e-book").  The book may be available but cost more than you want to spend. While looking at the Amazon listing for the book, you may see that you can order a used paper copy for very little. Generally, you can see if the book is in your nearest public library.  If you are a student, don't neglect to check your school library.  You can probably use your public library's website to have the book borrowed from neighboring libraries and transported to your library for pick-up.  

It is often a good idea to look up the book's title in Google.  You may find a downloadable PDF file of the book's contents.  You may also find that there are websites that discuss the book.  While looking up the book on the Amazon site, scroll down to see if you can find a good, inexpensive summary of the book.  More and more books, especially non-fiction ones, are summarized by one summary-making company or another.  Kindle Prime costs $10 a month but allows downloading of Kindle Unlimited books but only a maximum of 10 at a time.  Not all books are in the Kindle Unlimited offerings.  

You may want to start a list of books you are interested in since you can't read everything.  Put the list in a good notebook that you will not misplace. If you get interested, you might want to install reading software on a computer, tablet or smartphone for Kindle competitors, such as Kobo or Nook.  You might also want to look into audiobooks, such as those offered by Audible.

A new art form

Only daring brave people will be interested.  You get a somewhat cockeyed script but you perform it cold with no earlier readings or rehearsals.  The performance is live over the internet using Zoom.  The script begins with Act 4, scene 3.  Don't bother to look for the pages that come before - there aren't any.  This is a one scene play.  A sweet and innocent [older] girl comes into a room where four corpses lay about.  Aaaaaaaaah!  Horrorrrrrrrrrrrrr!

One of the actors just joined the production just yesterday but that doesn't matter.  The cast has not read the play together before.  One of the actors has only an out-of-date version of the play but gets sent him an up-to-date script by email during the performance.  Mention to him that his next line occurs in the middle of page 5.  

The twists and turns of the plot are unusual.  The murderess confesses that she took out the playwright because he wrote such a twisted, inferior plot.  Right there on stage, you can see her smacking her lips and smiling with pleasure at the satisfaction she has achieved with just a few killings.  The audience for the performance is not a large one but they are sophisticated, experienced elders with plenty of life experience.  They clearly perceive the level of self-control and the sensitivity to character needed to use this art form.  Just the sheer bravery and confidence needed is breath-taking all by itself.

Don't look for this level of wisdom and broadmindedness elsewhere.  It is going to be decades before this new art form is widely available, but I can feel your level of anticipation from here.

Writing for self

I have my eye on the book "The Writing Revolution" by Judith Hochman and Natalie Wexler.  These days when I get interested in a book, I have several steps to follow.  I looked the book up on Amazon to see the price of the Kindle format.  Sometimes there is no Kindle version.  Often, there is but the price is too high.  My head is the victim of what Kahneman and Tversky call "anchoring".  The first price for the first Kindle books was $9.99 so that price marks low prices off from high ones, for me.  

It seems to me that speech, writing and distant communication like telegraphs, telephones and email have had an enormous effect on human life, at least in some places and under some circumstances.  Besides, the books "Incognito" and "Seven and a Half Lessons about the Brain" make clear to me that we are all very, very complex.  Communication involves deciding to communicate, composing and creating and wording and re-wording, and delivering the communication.  So, I try to stay somewhat alert to ideas and activities involving communication.  Those two books emphasize some of the complexities of our bodies and brains involved in communicating.  "From Gutenberg to Google" by Tom Wheeler, former chair of the Federal Communications Commission, shows the effects of human communication over time.  

These days, with scams and hate speech and rumor mills (did you know that X sort of people want to eat your children?), it is clear that humans do all sorts of things with communication that are destructive and nasty.  This is not new: the Old Testament has many passages about the damage of rumors and gossip.

It is natural to focus on the delivery of communication since when I write a note of admiration, its effect doesn't begin until it is delivered and understood.  I have lately become interested in just the result of deciding what words express my admiration or gratitude, regardless of what happens to my composition after being made.  Today, while checking out The Writing Revolution, I learned about the many articles on the internet about blogging.  It is the writing that I think can be of value for one's mind and self, but I also advocate delivering or showing the writing to those who are interested. 

Town atmosphere

Stevens Point has an outdoor famer's market in the downtown public square on Saturday mornings during the summer. It is a fun place to visit.  This past Saturday morning, an indoor market opened in the Boys and Girls Club building.  It was surprising how neatly the stalls and stands were arranged by 8 AM.  

The spirits and smiles reminded me how often I see cheer and friendliness in this small city of 26,000.  Lynn made a slide-tape presentation about the history of the town in 1978.  Here is a link to the video 

Reasons For St. Pt.

This town has a good spirit.  The people are balanced and cheerful.  We have experienced community spirit in other places that aren't as optimistic and "can-do".  Maybe the spirit has to do with the fact that it is a college town.  Maybe it is the ethnic mix and background of the people.  

I know that I haven't even met every Point citizen and nobody is upbeat all the time but the town does seem to have a good share of cheer.