• Yes, you youngsters are right, this decade is all about pandering to Boomer nostalgia. Example: the Wikipedia entry for “Celebrity Jeopardy” (Saturday Night Live skit of the 1990s, featuring Norm McDonald as Turd Ferguson) is paragraphs longer than the entry for the eminent physicist Roger Penrose. Oh well. Let us old farts enjoy the ride.
• I continue to learn things about being 60. The latest thing is that it’s not such a good idea anymore to make non-refundable, pay-in-advance hotel reservations.
• In ancient times, the ellipsis had six dots. But the Roman Emperor Augustus vainly stole one of them from February to add to his own month, leaving five. Several centuries later, the Black Ink Shortage of 1455 forced printer Johannes Gutenberg to shrink the ellipsis to four dots. Finally, in the early 1900’s, overwhelmed immigration officers at Ellis Island shortened the ellipsis to three dots, where it remains to this day. . .
• Consider nice vs love. We are romantically conditioned to prefer the idea of love. But being nice involves action that benefits another, whereas feeling love does not necessarily affect anything outside one’s own cranium.
• Success and failure are superposed quantum states.
• We have a pet betta fish. It is orange-yellow and its name is Carotene. We feed it two bits of food in the morning and one bit at dinner time. The way this fish attacks its food, you would think it had the DNA of a brook trout. That’s the end of this story. It is sort of like a Garrison Keillor story in that it just ends, wistfully, crafted so as to make you sit back and think, ahh, isn’t life quietly wonderful.
• One of the more disturbing ideas I’ve had lately is that my “Thoughts at Large” posts are the blog equivalent of the 1970’s McCartney song, “Uncle Albert/Admiral Halsey.” If so, I’m so sorry.
• As the American public grows ever more weary and cynical of “advocates” (those who stake out positions for which only one side of an argument is ever presented), it learns to distrust and tune out, and it eventually loses the capacity to evaluate evidence, if such a loss has not already taken place. It seems our democracy’s much-vaunted war of ideas is to be won not by fact but by enhanced insistence techniques.
• Talk Soup: a good thing to forget about the 90’s. You don’t remember Talk Soup? Good. One less thing you have to think about on your Day of Atonement.
• I live only a few miles from I-240, The Billy Graham Freeway, and I drive it every week. Whenever I see its roadside dedication sign, I find it hard to forget these words exchanged in April 1973 by President Nixon and Rev. Graham, on the topic of television coverage of Nixon’s speech announcing the resignations of his top aides and cabinet members:
Nixon: “What did CBS do? Did they knock it?”
Graham: “I felt like slashing their throats, but anyway God be with you.”
I-240 in Asheville should be rededicated as The Robert Frost Freeway. A road that reminds us of promises to keep and the miles to go before we sleep.
“I told you. I’m not playing unless my side gets four outs. It’s my ball, anyway. I’ll just go home and take my ball with me. Then no one can play. Is that what you want?”
“Aw, come on, Johnny. No one gets four outs. You can’t just change the rules. This is baseball. Come on, we’re all here to play. Let’s just play.”
“No. I told you. Four outs for my team.”
“Geez! What is it with you? You know I’m not going to say yes to that! It’s not fair!”
“You didn’t ask your team yet. I say, four outs for our side or else no one plays. Ask the rest of your team.”
“Okay, okay, what a dork. Okay, you heard him, what do you guys say to four outs for Johnny’s team? There you go. They all say no. Now come on, don’t be dumb, let’s play.”
“How about this then. We’ll play if you give us four outs an inning for this game, and we can decide about the next game later.”
“But that’s the same thing! Johnny, you’re just wasting our time. Let’s play by the rules. We can’t just change the rules of baseball for you. If we do it now, next time you’ll want five outs!”
“You know what? You’re the one who doesn’t want to play. You won’t give up anything. All we wanted was four outs an inning, just for this game, and now you’re going to spoil it for everyone. You’re just being stubborn. Everyone here wants to play ball and you’re the reason we’re not playing.”
“This is crazy! What’s the point playing baseball if we don’t play by baseball rules?”
“I’m waaay-tinnnnng.”
“No! Johnny, this is making you look stupid. There’s no point in talking about this.”
“Who are you calling stupid? Now you don’t want to talk. You just care about winning. Boy, this is some damn game! Lookit, your team doesn’t want to cancel the game and neither do I. All we’re asking is to sit down and have a discussion and then play the game. Simple as that. But it all has to begin with a simple discussion. And you won’t even talk. Wow! Come on guys, let’s go home.”
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* For more information about bullying, visit the web site StopBullying.gov. The first thing you will see on the screen: “Due to the lapse in government funding, only web sites supporting excepted functions will be updated unless otherwise funded. As a result, the information on this website may not be up to date, the transactions submitted via the website may not be processed, and the agency may not be able to respond to inquiries until appropriations are enacted.”