*My “prayer list” is getting too long.
- Marty Baker told me the lord giveth. For a while. Then he starts taking away.
- I can’t decide whether to sue my shrinking ass for not doing it’s job, or to buy some suspenders.
*My “prayer list” is getting too long.
Some new poker friends chastied Dennis for continued smoking. Finally he explained “…at least on three occasions smoking has kept me from going to prision for life.
Those times I was about to shoot my wife I found out I could go out to the back yard and smoke about 3 or 4 cigarrettes . Calmed me right down!”
Recently I saw the Will Smith portrayal of Mr. Williams and family. Below are articles iI have written, the first in 2007:
KING RICHARD 2007 (from PLAY IS WHERE LIFE IS)
Another factor in American tennis can’t be overlooked. The role of parents. Connors (mother ), McEnroe (father), Evert (father), Aggassi (father, brother), and the Williams’ sisters, are ample proof that the tremendous role of parents in the development of Championship level American players.
Mr. Williams certainly gets the award for “out of the box” results. To train one child to be #1 in the world is amazing, but #1 and #2 at the same time is un- precedented. And done without normal routes of American Junior play and USTA super-support says a lot. I have to say I was disappointed by the way the Williams sisters were often treated by many in American tennis.
*********
FEB. 2022
Being a tennis teacher/coach, the film’s depiction of how this happened was both interesting and historical. Much theory about tennis has evolved in the last fifty years. Mr. Williams taught himself from this explosion. Pronation of the wrist when serving, open stance forehands, maximum number of hits and drilling, throwing the racket in service motion, ball can serve targets, etc.
The names of Braden, Macci. many players, country clubs to ghetto, spot on.
Many have noted tennis at high level is like fighting with rackets rather than gloves. How the trainers brought along young boxers was a common part of understanding that losing (particularly singularly ) is tough. The choice to skip junior tournaments was maybe the most important and unique choice made.
There was a more important lesson made in the film and in reality. A bigger lesson. Richard Williams showed the route to success in American tennis. Families are our best teachers and coaches and academies. No one cares like good parents.
Whatever sport , or whether sports, parental leadership works best.
The Williams family taught a big lesson. Richards’ father ran from danger. When Venus was in her darkest moment he ran to her (‘ I have never been more proud of you”).
He risked his life. He gave his life. Give him credit.
*********
Patrick Mouratoglon, Serena Williams’ tennis coach, said it. The commentators missed a great chance. Was the USTA listening closely? His point about Co Co Gault’s win over Venus Williams was, here is another example of where great American tennis players have come from, then and now. What better example could you want: From Richard Williams and Venus and Serena, to 2019 Wimbledon and Co Co and her parents. The Bryan brothers and their dad, Isner and his mom, all the way back to Chris Evert and her father. Connors and mom. McEnroe/Father. No one gives their attention to a child like parents. There were five American men entered in the 2019 French Open. Tiafoe, at #32, was the only seeded American male. Taylor Fritz won a first round match. The rest lost.
For the umpteenth time, all entities sincerely interested in developing quality American tennis players, should demand a reasonable slice of college tennis scholarships for American students. Parents need help, a carrot at the end.
Former college tennis players
Jack Kramer, Arthur Ashe, Stan Smith, John McEnroe, Bob and Mike Bryant, Jim Courier, Brad Gilbert, Bill Tilden, Roscoe Tanner, Jimmy Connors, Dennis Ralston, Dick Stockton, Vitas Gerulaitis, Michael Chang, Malavai Washington, Todd Martin, Bob Lutz, Bill Talbert, Tony Trabert,, Vince Spadea, John Isner, Steve Johnson, MANY MORE.
***Quote of the day—by GOP’s Majorie Taylor Greene. Cites “…Pelosi’s Gazpacho Police”
Your children are not your children.
They are the sons and daughters of Life’s longing for itself.
They come through you but not from you,
And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you.
You may give them your love but not your thoughts.
For they have their own thoughts.
You may house their bodies but not their souls,
For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams.
You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you.
For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday.
You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth.
The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far.
Let your bending in the archer’s hand be for gladness;
For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.
I am considering doing edition 3 of THE LITTLE GREEN BOOK of TENNIS. Since published in 2015 (first edition ) high school teams have all changed players. Fifty percent of coaches have turned over. And, as always , things in the sports world change fast.
For years football coaches have often recruited unhappy players from other teams. Or those who can legally transfer and play at a different school. The new NCAA “Portals Rule ” has jetstreamed this strategy. One of the sad side effects of “Portals ” is that high school seniors are overlooked for older and seasoned upperclass college kids.
My guess is that this avenue will adopted to American college tennis. And it will undoubtedly involve international players who can now easily move to “greener pastures. American high school aspirants will be moved down the prospects list, or be dismissed even quicker.
Yesterday was my son’s 47th birthday. His son, James is 6.
They brought with them one of the new virtual reality cameras now on sale to the public.
People my age either neglected technology or struggled mightily with which button to push.
A luddite, covid constrained, my only tudors were my sons. The older quit answering the phone. The aforementioned younger eventually made the limits clear: “I’m not your technology ( blank ) or prostitute.” I did ask a lot. Hell, you need a lot
My brightest friend (not a long list) simply gave up. Screw a password.
A ten year tennis camper once yelled me, up in the shaded tower, “Hey, we need some help down here!”
Every age needs some kind of help.
I saw recently a youngster has created a support group for seniors comprised of young capables .
And, my offspring revealed a crucial moment in tech: Age 47 asked age 6, “…how do you change from
roller coaster to menu?” James told him how.
Guess that means when you turn 47 the young ones take over.
Below are notes taken from books read recently. A rough collection.
YUVAL HARARI’’S BOOKS
HIGH LIGHTS
In a nutshell #1 dealt with our past. 2. Our future, and 3. The Present
SAPIENS;
We are the deadliest species in the annals of biology
PAGE 4 SUMMARY
13.5 years ago—BIG BANG
Sapiens show up 70k, 70k ago neanderthals soon gone
Clue to Sapiens—gossip ability—led to communities, Law,religion,rules,communication.
Biology rules—hormones, genes, synapses
150 is ideal number for groups.
Page 360, parents in full retreat
From 1000 ad to 500 ad, not much happened.
500 million people in 1500 ad. 2014 there are 7 billion.
Happiness bulb born with, doesn’t change much.
Artificial Intelligence is the future. Not religion, God, Nature etc.
2—HOMO DEUS—a brief history of tomorrow
**deals with future. Mankind’s quest to upgrade humans to gods.
**mankind has almost and will conquer the three remaining super problems: famine, plague, and war. No need to work. Task—find
“happiness.
**artificial intelligence—where to go from here.
**homo sapiens may be more like Neanderthals the future homo deus.
**homo deus is where mankind is headed.
21 LESSONS for the 21st century
Protecting ourselves—war, ecology
What to do with fake news, terrorism
How to prepare our children for the future
“When has history been fair”?
Current problems: climate change, dying liberal democracy, a new world war? Fake news, technology goes wrong, immigration, the meaning of life today,.
Technology giving us the power to “reshape and reengineer humanity.
‘the reliance on the heart may prove to be the Achilles heel of liberal democracy.
Some folks are smarter than others. Listen to algorithms.
BxCxD=AHH! Biological knowledge multiplied by computing power multiplied by data = ability to hack humans c
***************
Some other good stuff:
THE BODY by Bill Bryson
*page 14 on skin color—sliver from cadaver, one millimeter thick from epidermis. That’s all
*memory: recall a deck of cards after 30 minutes. Oriental girl 17 seconds?
* teenagers in cars. Another teenager in car? Rate goes up 400x. page pp 63
* human brain shrunk size of tennis ball
* EXERCISE: 80% us men are overweight, 77% women. 35% are obese.
* FITBIT—tie to dog to up totals for job
* BIPEDS== YES BUT BACKS, KNEES. PELVIS—CHILDBIRTH.
*weight for women in 1960 was 144 to 166. Men 166 to 196.
* SITTING TO MUCH.
* I was your first wife!
* Asthma—good section pages 216-221. SMOKING FOLLOWS
* HICCUPS—one guy had them 67 years!
****************
OUTLIERS—The Story of Success/by Malcolm Gladwell
CANADIAN JR. HOCKEY ALL-STARS (born n Jan. Why? The outlier?
10,000 hours. Bill Gates and PC. BEATLES—Pretty bad. Hamburg strip clubs . HAD TO PLAY 8 HOURS. PRACTICE,.
THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING JEWISH. JOE FLOM AND HOSTILE TAKEOVERS. WHEN TIME CAME, TIME WAS IN.
–BORN IN DEPRESSION—TAKE NO CHANCES.
JEWS AND THE GARMENT INDUSTRY. 3RD GENERATION WERE LAWYERS AND DRS. THE CHILDREN OF THE BOOK.
A CULTURE OF HONOR. SOUTHERNERS CALLED ASSHOLE WILL FIGHT YOU.
KOREAN CO-PILOTS AND NYC AIRPORT CONTROL.LERS
NOT OUTLIERS AT ALL. They are products of history and community, opportunity and legacy. Their success is not exceptional or mysterious.
Due to advantages, inheritances, , luck, some earned,,come not, variables critical to making them who they are
*****************
MICHIO KAKU
HIGH POINT LECTURE WITH NIDO QUEBEIN—OUTSTANDING HOUR.
THE FUTURE OF HUMANITY
WILL FUTURE PIONEERS SEARCH SPACE FOR A NEW SAFE HOME AS THE AFRICANS DID, KNOWING THEIR GENERATION WOULD NOT BENEFIT, BUT OFFSPRING MAY?
—-NEAREST STAR TO US IS 4.2 LIGHT YEARS AWAY.
—-THREE WAVES OF SCIENCE MECHANICAL, ELECTRICAL, TECH.
—ADVANCED CIVILIZATIONS SEEM POSSIBLE
——-ADMIRAL ZENG OF CHINA, BOATS 5X TIME COLUMBUS. NEXT EMPEROR BANNED SCIENCE. LET TO POVERTY AND DOOMED ANY PROGRESS
—PRESERVING HUMANS BY FREEZING NOT A CRAZY IDEA?
—-ARE WE IN THE LAST GENERATION TO DIE— IMMORTALITY NEAR?
—-FARMER===EVERY CHILD MAKES YOU RICHER. CITY==EVERY CHILD MAKES YOU POORER!
SCHIZOPHENICS. EVERYONE TALKS TO SELF. NO LEFT BRAIN TO PREFRONTAL CORTEX—-VOICES SEEM REAL.—
CLIMATE CHANGE—SEE ADDENDUM YUVAL HARARI’’S BOOKS
*************
HIGH LIGHTS
In a nutshell #1 dealt with our past. 2. Our future, and 3. The Present
SAPIENS;
We are the deadliest species in the annals of biology
PAGE 4 SUMMARY
13.5 years ago—BIG BANG
Sapiens show up 70k, 70k ago neanderthals soon gone
Clue to Sapiens—gossip abillity—led to communities, law,religion,rules,communication.
Biology rules—hormones, genes, synapses
150 is ideal number for groups.
Page 360, parents in full retreat
From 1000 ad to 500 ad, not much happened.
500 million people in 1500 ad. 2014 there are 7 billion.
Happiness bulb born with, doesn’t change much.
Artificial Intelligence is the future. Not religion, God, Nature etc.
2—HOMO DEUS—a brief history of tomorrow
**deals with future. Mankind’s quest to upgrade humans to gods.
**mankind has almost and will conquer the three remaining super problems: famine, plague, and war. No need to work. Task—find
“happiness.
**artificial intelligence—where to go from here.
**homo sapiens may be more like Neanderthals the future homo deus.
**homo deus is where mankind is headed.
21 LESSONS for the 21st century
Protecting ourselves—war, ecology
What to do with fake news, terrorism
How to prepare our children for the future
“When has history been fair”?
Current problems: climate change, dying liberal democracy, a new world war? Fake news, technology goes wrong, immigration, the meaning of life today,.
Technology giving us the power to “reshape and reengineer humanity.
‘the reliance on the heart may prove to be the Achilles heel of liberal democracy.
Some folks are smarter than others. Listen to algorithms.
BxCxD=AHH! Biological knowledge multiplied by computing power multiplied by data = ability to hack humans c
Page 2
Some other good stuff:
THE BODY by Bill Bryson
*page 14 on skin color—sliver from cadaver, one millimeter thick from epidermis. That’s all
*memory: recall a deck of cards after 30 minutes. Oriental girl 17 seconds?
* teenagers in cars. Another teenager in car? Rate goes up 400x. page pp 63
* human brain shrunk size of tennis ball
* EXERCISE: 80% us men are overweight, 77% women. 35% are obese.
* FITBIT—tie to dog to up totals for job
* BIPEDS== YES BUT BACKS, KNEES. PELVIS—CHILDBIRTH.
*weight for women in 1960 was 144 to 166. Men 166 to 196.
* SITTING TO MUCH.
* I was your first wife!
* Asthma—good section pages 216-221. SMOKING FOLLOWS
* HICCUPS—one guy had them 67 years!
*
OUTLIERS—The Story of Success/by Malcolm Gladwell
CANADIAN JR. HOCKEY ALL-STARS (born n Jan. Why? The outlier?
10,000 hours. Bill Gates and PC. BEATLES—Pretty badl Hamburg strip clubs . HAD TO PLLAY 8 HOURS. PRACTICE,.
THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING JEWISH. JOE FLOM AND HOSTILE TAKEOVERS. WHEN TIME CAME, TIME WAS IN.
–BORN IN DEPRESSION—TAKE NO CHANCES.
JEWS AND THE GARMENT INDUSTRY. 3RD GENERATION WERE LAWYERS AND DRS. THE CHILDREN OF THE BOOK.
A CULTURE OF HONOR. SOUTHERNERS CALLED ASSHOLE WILL FIGHT YOU.
KOREAN CO-PILOTS AND NYC AIRPORT CONTROL.LERS
NOT OUTLIERS AT ALL. They are products of history and community, opportunity and legacy. Their success is not exceptional or mysterious.
Due to advantages, inheritances, , luck, some earned,,come not, variables critical to making them who they are.
MICHIO KAKU
HIGH POINT LECTURE WITH NIDO QUEBEIN—OUTSTANDING HOUR.
THE FUTURE OF HUMANITY
WILL FUTURE PIONEERS SEARCH SPACE FOR A NEW SAFE HOME AS THE AFRICANS DID, KNOWING THEIR GENERATION WOULD NOT BENEFIT, BUT OFFSPRING MAY?
—-NEAREST STAR TO US IS 4.2 LIGHT YEARS AWAY.
—-THREE WAVES OF SCIENCE MECHANICAL, ELECTRICAL, TECH.
—ADVANCED CIVILIZATIONS SEEM POSSIBLE
——-ADMIRAL ZENG OF CHINA, BOATS 5X TIME COLUMBUS. NEXT EMPEROR BANNED SCIENCE. LET TO POVERTY AND DOOMED ANY PROGRESS
—PRESERVING HUMANS BY FREEZING NOT A CRAZY IDEA?
—-ARE WE IN THE LAST GENERATION TO DIE— IMMORTALITY NEAR?
—-FARMER===EVERY CHILD MAKES YOU RICHER. CITY==EVERY CHILD MAKES YOU POORER!
SCHIZOPHENICS. EVERYONE TALKS TO SELF. NO LEFT BRAIN TO PREFRONTAL CORTEX—-VOICES SEEM REAL.—
CLIMATE CHANGE—SEE ADDENDUM
*************
NEW BOOK-“RANGE” by David Epstein
TIGER WOODS VS ROGER FEDERER OR 10,000 HOURS (MALCOLM GLADWELL AND “OUTLIERS (TIGER), OR FED AND A DIVERSE BACKGROUND.
MERH CD’/ MERCEDES
AVERAGE AGE OF A FOUNDER IS 45
EVERYONE NEEDS HABITS OF MIND THAT ALLOW THEM TO DANCE ACROOS THE DISCIPLINES
NO TOOL IS OMNIPOTENT
TO APPLY KNOWLEDGE BROADLY REQUIRES BROAD KNOWLEDGE
OLYMPIANS AT 12-13 -RANGE
MUSICIANS —TRY AND CAN USE 3 OR MORE INSTRUMENTS
DAVE BRUBECK (TAKE FIVE) COULDN’T READ MUSIC
TO ACQIRE KNOWLEDGE SLOWLY HELPS YOU MAKE THE RIGHT MATCH
WINNERS NEVER QUIT (YET TO HONOR OR GOOD SENSE (W. CHURCHCHILL)
YOUNG PEOPLE SHOULD TAKE RISKS
“SUNK COST FALLACY” CUT AND RUN, KNOW WHEN TO FOLD. DEAD HORSE.
IN GOD WE TRUST. ALL OTHERS BRING DATA. NO DATA—REASON
THE GAME IS THE BEST TEACHER
BREAKTHROUGH AND FALLACY LOOK A LOT ALIKE INITIALLY
“IT IS AN EXPERIMENT, AS ALL OF LIFE IS AN EXPERIMENT” OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.
********
“The Biggest Bluff” by Maria Konnikova
Author Konnikova is a professional psychologist who selects professional poker as a place to examine self, skill, luck and life. Below are simply some conclusions she arrives at. P.S.—She hired Eric Seidel, world champion of poker, as her coach:
And the biggest bluff of all? That skill can ever be enough. That’s the hope that allows us to move forward in those moments when luck is most stacked against us, the useful delusion that lets us push o rather than give up. We don’t know, we can’t ever know, if we’ll manage or not. But we must convince ourselves that we can. That, in the end, our skill will be enough to carry the day. Because it has to be.
Admitting to unknowing, accepting a lack of agency without resorting to gimmicks, and instead attempting to analyze the unknown as best we can with the tools of rationality: those are some of the most powerful steps we can take.
Those afraid of the universe as it really is, those who wish to pretend to nonexistent knowledge and control and a Cosmos centered on human beings, will prefer superstition.
Nothing is all skill. Ever. I shy away from absolutes, but this one callout for my embrace. Because life is life, luck will always be a factor in anything we might do or undertake, but should chance go against us, all our skill can do is mitigate the damage.
I hope I can keep playing for a very, very long time. I don’t want to have to retire. This game is just too damn interesting. It’s such a beautiful game.
And it is. It really is.
*******************************
THE GOD DELUSION by Richard Dawkins
The religion of one age is the literary entertainment of the next.
Ralph Waldo Emerson.
If people wish to love a 7th century preacher more than their own families, that is up to them, but nobody else is obliged to take it seriously.
Behead those who say islam is a violent religion.
I will fight them every step of the way if they try to dictate their moral convictions to all Americans in the name of conservatism.
We who love science must remember that the enemy of our enemies is our friend.
George W. Bush says God told him to invade Iraq ( a pity God didn’t vouchsafe the a revelation that there were no weapons of mass destruction.)
One of the truly bad effect of religion is that it teaches us that is a virtue to be satisfied with not understanding.
Politics has slain thousands, but religion has slain its tens of thousands.
Those who can make you believe in absurdities can also make you commit atrocities.
There is in every village a torch—the teacher
And an extinguisher—-the clergyman.“
That it will never come again
is what makes life so sweet.
There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio,
than are dreamt in your “philosophy”.
What I see in Nature is a magnificent structure that we can comprehend only very imperfectly, and that must fill a thinking person with a feeling of humility. This is a genuinely religious feeling that has nothing to do with mysticism.
The idea of a personal god is quite alien to me and seems even naive. Einstein
Everybody gets absolutely frantic about it because you’re not allowed to say these things. Yet when you look at it rationally there is no reason why those ideas shouldn’t be as open to debate as any other, except that we have agreed somehow between us that they should’t be.
The priests of the different religious sects…..dread the advance of science as witches do the approach of daylight, and scowl on the fatal harbinger announcing the subdivision of the duperies on which they live. Thomas Jefferson
*************
SEPTEMBER 2021—BOOK COMMENTS CONTINUED
“Fields of Blood” (Religion and the History of Violence ) by Karen Armstrong.
At first this book seemed too deep. Indeed the detail and scholarship are thorough. Looking again I saw this as an excellent text for religion majors.
Atlantic Christian College , my alma mater, changed its name to Barton. I never knew much about the namesake (Barton Stone) but found these on page 274 of Fields of Blood:
“…Barton Stone railed against the aristocratic clergy who tried to force the erudite faith of Harvard on the people.
“Enlightenment philosophers had insisted that people must have the courage to throw off their dependence on authority, use their natural reason to discover the truth, and think for themselves.”
“When Stone founded his own denomination, he called it a ‘declaration of independence’: bringing modern ideals of democracy equality, freedom of speech, and independence … (to the populace).
Armstrong demonstrates again and again that the great spasms of cruelty and killing through history have had little or no religious overlay. In modern times Hitler, Stalin and Mao were all atheists, and the power behind the Holocaust, Armstrong says, was an ethnic rather than a religious hatred. An overemphasis on religion’s damage can blind people to the nonholy terrors that their states inflict. NYT REVIEW by James Fallows—2014)
…the main hope for peace is to keep faith and statecraft separate.
****************
****ENLIGHTENMENT NOW by Steven Pinker. Sub- title is spot on (the case for reason, science, humanism, and progress).
This was a “stumble on” that is very good.
Louie: CK “The foundations of capitalism are shattering…” REALLY?
“…maybe we need some time where we are wandering around with a donkey with pots clanging on the sides…”
Flight—-sat on runway 40 minutes.
??? miracle of human flight—-sitting in a chair in the sky—New York to California in 5 hours is slow? Used to take 30 years and many would die, with an arrow through your throat. They’d put your hat on a stick and bury you and keep walking!
Page 9 on what educated Englishman (1600) would believe…witches, werewolves, unicorns, base metal to gold, etc. century later he believes none of these.
Thomas Jefferson: light from me doesn’t diminish my flame. Instruction is the same way…
“Nothing is more responsible for the good old days than a bad memory”
Chris Rock: “ this is the first society in history where the poor people are fat.”
“…global citizen is 125 times more likely to die in an accident…” than a terrorist attack. for Americans—3000 times!
“We have at our fingertips…all the works of genius prior to our time…” plus that of our time. Those before had neither,
Three main threats: Overpopulation, Resource Depletion, and Pollution.
NASA: Man is the lowest cost, 150 pound, non linear, all-purpose computer system, which can be mass produced by unskilled labor.
“…society advances funeral by funeral!”
God and reason: “…faith, revelation, scripture, authority, tradition, and subjective appeal are not arguments at all.”
Incompatible beliefs, how many gods?, different religions, different sources, which miracles?, what they demand.
human errors, factual errors, plagiarism, scientific absurdness.
****************
*****CHERRY PICKING OTHERS (lOVE AND THEFT—DYLAN)
FORGET THE ALAMO. This book contends much of “Alamo lore” is Alamo myth!
Real reason? Europeans were choosing cotton for clothing. This part of Texas was ideal for cotton farming—if you had slaves to do the work. Mexico was anti-slavery.
************
AMERICAN HAPPINESS AND DISCONTENTS
the unruly torrent
(2008-2020) by George Will
CTE—1966- bear bryant’s heaviest player weight 223 lbs. 2011 NFL had 320 players weighing 300.
two bad features—violence and committee meetings (huddles)
…not the rules but the fiction that football can be fixed and still resemble the game fans relish.”
louisville brought pros and strippers to the bball dorm 22 times in 2 years. pitino—duh? yet hired by Iona.
“Drugs drain sport admirable excellence, which elevates as well as competitors.”
Wills cites vague “einstein” stanza from DESOLATION ROW. Final one clearer?
Yes, I received your letter yesterday, about the time the doorknob broke
When you asked me how I was doing, was that some kind of joke
All these people that you mention, yes, I know them, they’re quite lame
I had to rearrange their faces and give them all another name
Right now, I can’t read too good, don’t send me no more letters no
Not unless you mail them from Desolation Row
“Do not speak unless you can improve on silence.”
ON VIETNAM
Easier to muddle through than to admit you were wrong
Westmoreland ( “never had general so effectively willed away the facts”)
Famous photo? plain clothed Viet Cong who had just cut the throat of a South Vietnamese officer’s wife, six children, and the officer’s Mother.
NO WAR IS OVER UNTIL THE LAST VETERAN IS DEAD
Size of our universe
page 55 —ton of facts
If there were only 3 bees in America, the air would be more crowded with bees than space is with stars.
A dog was trained to emit a whimpering sound every time it heard the word HILARY.
“College: The best seven years of my life!”
there is something to be said for exposing yourself to ideas other than your own.
Will—Chernow’s GRANT is great history writing.
More dying by lifestyle increasing!
**************8
ON EUTHANASIA—-Pages 354-355.
“I am doing everything I can to continue to live. No one should have the right to prolong my death.”
People spoke jauntily of “the conquest of space.” Well.
The universe, 99.9 (and at least fifty-eight other nines) percent of which is already outside Earth’s atmosphere, is expanding (into we know not what) at forty-six miles per second per mega parsec. (One megaparsec is approximately 3.26 million light years.) Astronomers are studying light that has taken perhaps 12 billion years to reach their instruments. This cooling cinder called Earth, spinning in the darkness at the back of beyond, is a minor speck of residue from the Big Bang, which lasted less than a billionth of a trillionth of a trillionth of a second 13.8 billion years ago. The estimated number of stars—they come and go— is 100 followed by twenty-two zeros. The visible universe (which is hardly all of it) contains more than 150 billion galaxies, each with billions of stars. But if there were only three bees in America, the air would be core crowded with bees than space is with stars. The distances, and the violently unheavenly conditions in “the heavens”, tell us that our devices will roam our immediate cosmic neighborhood, but in spite of Apollo 11’s still-darling achievement, we are not really going anywhere.
EUTHANASIA (PAGES 354-355
Cederquist says the most common reason for requesting assistance in dying is not “intolerable physical suffering”. Rather, it is “existential suffering”, including loss of meaning,” as from the ability to relate to others. The prospect of being “unable to interact” can be as intolerable as physical suffering, and cannot be alleviated by hospice or other palliative care.
In some countries, doctors actively administer lethal injections. No U.S. jurisdiction allows doctors to go beyond writing prescriptions for lede-ending drugs to be self administered orally by persons retaining decisional capacity.
Almost 30 percent of Medicare expenditures are for patients in the last six months of life, and about 16 percent of patients die in, or soon after leaving, intensive care units. Financial reasons should be decisive in setting end-of-life policy, but Cederquist notes that reducing “expensive and inappropriate care”— costly and agonizing resistance to imminent death “is the lowest-tech thing we can do in medicine.”Hence the importance of “slow medicine geriatrics,” avoiding a “rush to those interventions that build on each other”and thereby enmesh doctors and patients in ethical conundrums.The American Medical Association remains opposed to physician assistance in dying; the California Medical Association has moved from opposition to neutrality. Litigation has been unsuccessful in seeking judicial affirmation of a high that California’s legislature should establish. Legislation to do this has been authored by Assemblywoman Susan Eggman, chair of the Democratic caucus.
There are reasons for wariness. An illness’s sox-month trajectory can be uncertain. A right to die can become a felt obligation, particularly among bewildered persons tangled in the toils of medical technologies, or persons with meager family resources. And as a reason for ending life, mental suffering itself calls into question the existence of the requisite decisional competence.
Today’s culture of casual death (see Planned Parenthood videos )should deepen worries about a slippery slope from physician-assisted dying a further diminution of life’s sanctity. Life, however, is inevitably lived on multiple slippery slopes:Taxation could become confiscation, police could become instruments of oppression, public education could become indoctrination, etc. Everywhere and always, civilization depends on the drawing of intelligent distinctions.
Jennifer Glass, a Californian who died August 11, drew one. She said to her state legislators, “I’m doing everything I can to extend my life. No one should have the right to prolong my death”.
The Economist reports that in the seventeen years under Oregon’s pioneering 1997 law, just 1,327 people have received prescriptions for lethal medications—about seventy-four a year—and one third of those did not use them. Possessing the option was sufficient reassurance.
There is nobility is suffering bravely borne, but also in affirming at the end the distinctive human dignity of autonomous choice.Brittany Maynard, who chose to be with loved ones when she self-administered her lethal medications was asleep in five minutes and soon dead.
****************
Larry McMurtry on North Carolina’s Triangle Rraleigh, Durham, Chapel Hill ) area : “ This prosperous area is the homeland of the yuppie redneck, a Southerner with working class prejudices and upper-middle- class money.
*****************
THE DAWN OF EVERYTHING (A new history of everything ) by David Graeber and David Wen grow )
This 2021, 600 plus page history of humanity was too much for me. Maybe a couple of excerpts will inspire more capable students:
THE DAWN OF EVERYTHING David Graeber and David Wengrow
Since the financial crash of 2008, and the upheavals that followed, the question of inequality –
and with it, the long-term history of inequality — have become major topics for debate. Something of a consensus has emerged among intellectuals and even, to some degree, the political classes that levels of social inequality have got out of hand, and that most of the world’s problems result, in one way or another, from an ever-widening gulf between the haves and have nots. Pointing this out is in itself a challenge to global power structures; at the same time, though, it frames the issue in a way that people who benefit from those structures can still find ultimately reassuring, since it implies no meaningful solution to the problem would ever be possible.
In developing the scientific means to know our own past, we have exposed the mythical substructure of our “social science” — what once appeared unassailable axioms, the stable points around which our self-knowledge is organized, are scattering like mice. What is the purpose of all this new knowledge, it not to reshape our conceptions of who we are and what we might yet become? If not, in other words, to rediscover the meaning of our third basic freedom,: the freedom to create new and different forms of social reality?
The “morning after” scene from ONE EYED JACKS:
Rio (Marlon Brando)——“… everything I told you last night was a lie! I rob banks for a living”.
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THIS IS ASSISTED DYING by Stefanie Green
This is a very kind book.
My Mother died at age 93. Near the end my sister and I were called in for a conference with her . She patiently listened while he detailed the reasons that it wouldn’t be long! When he finally finished he asked her if she had any questions?
She simply turned to my sister and me and with a wry smile quoted a country song—-“so long, its been good to know you”!
Over the years I have compiled many of the final words spoken by my patients and think this list makes a fitting end for this book. DR. GREEN
Thank you all for being here
I’m so ready
Take care of each other
Fire!
I did it my way
Goodbye, my sweet
Let’s get going already
I need this to happen
Thanks for your support
Here we go…..
Now, please
Take care of yourselves
I love you
Let ‘er rip!
Bless you
Thanks for the memories
My only regret was…(fell asleep)
I’m ready now
See ya, suckers!
I love you all
I’ll be watching you
See you on the other side
I’m so glad you’re here
Give it to me ….let’s go!
(looking at me) I love you
*****************
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BOOM TOWN by Garrison Keillor
Couple of comments on two Wobegon residents:
On VANITY—-One 75 year old prided himself in being able to put his new briefs on while standing. He got his big toe caught in the elastic waistband, tripped, and he cracked his skull on the bathtub. Moral: Old folks should sit down to put your underwear on!
First love, Arlene, is dying. She warns 1. Not to say “she passed”, or 2. Don’t call any service a “celebration of life”. `
Also Arlene. She confirmed that Reverend F. Houston Youngdahl did not acknowledge a superfart escapee, while performing last rites ( occurred when he bent over to pick up his dropped bible ). Conclusion: “When a man refuses to take ownership of his own farts, he loses moral authority”.
(FOREVER YOUNG?)
May you have eternal happiness
In the land you’re going to,
May everyone be loving
And always kind to you.
May you play a round of golf each day, and have a perfect score
May you live forevermore.
May you play Bingo every night
And always win the prize
And be reunited with your dog
And walk the golden shore.
*************
― Hannah Arendt, The Origins of TotalitarianismI
“The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the convinced Communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction (i.e., the reality of experience) and the distinction between true and false (i.e., the standards of thought) no longer exist.”
THE DEATH OF TRUTH–by Steven Brill ( 2024 )
This is about “Fake News”.
” Over the last two decades these two sets of algorithms have powered an information environment that has—among too many people in too many places–extingushed the idea of truth and created unprecedented opportunity for conspiiracy theorists, hucksters, demagogues, and dictators who thrive on distrust and division. “
Is this not an urgent moment in the history of relationships?
Should there not be the possibily of a legal “covid divorce” or “pandemic
separation” during this severe confinment period. Some form of
no-guilt, no-penalty flight possibility, allowable during this moment that threatens
marriage, co-habitation, motherhood, etc.?
BOB DYLAN QUOTES
BOB QUOTES —FINAL
John Roberts’ 139 Bob Dylan quotes appear on QUARA.
They are listed below. The next list is my effort to match Bob quotes
with the songs the quotes come from. I could not find four.
Some years back I did a similar project. Quotes Test 1 is a
matching test with selected quotes to be matched with correct
song titles. Answers are next (Don’t peek ).
Dylan Quotes Test 2, is similar with quotes and songs from
“Old Bob Dylan”, several from the Roberts’ collection, and
some “New Bob Dylan quotes.
John Roberts
I have been addicted to music from the age of 10.
What are some of the best quotes from Bob Dylan?
I am a huge Bob Dylan fan. I have a file on my computer were I collect quotes from Dylan.
I do not claim to understand all of them, but find them compelling.
So here they are :
ANSWERS TO JOHN ROBERT’S FAVORITE QUOTES
1. It’s All Right Ma 26 One Too Many Mornings
2. Visions of Johanna 27 Changing Of The Guard
3. When The deal goes Down 28 Restless Farewell
4. Sign on The Cross 29 Dreamin’ of You
5. To Ramona 30. Lonesome Day Blues
6. No Time To Talk 31 Changing of The Guard
7. Is Your Love In Vain 32 It’s All Right Maw
8. Bob Dylan’s Dream 33 Heart of Mine
9. Gates Of Eden 34 Journey Through the Dark Heat
10 Gates Of Eden 35 Golden Tom-Silver Judas
11 Seeing The Real You at Last 36 Dark Eyes
12 Love Minus Zero 37. Shelter From the Storm
13 A Spanish Mary 38 Idiot Wind
14 No Time To Think 39 I Forgot to Remember to FORGET
15 All Along The Watchtower 40 Where Are You Tonight
16 Gates Of Eden 41 Huck’s Tune
17 With God On Our Side 42 I Dreamed I saw St. Augustine
18 Dark Eyes 43 Journey Through the Dark Heat
19 To Ramona 44 High Water
20 Slow Train Coming 45 Lost On The River
21 Restless Farewell 46 Positively Fourth Street
22 I’ll Keep It With Mine 47 When The Deal Goes Down
23 We Better Talk This Over 48 Kansas City
24 The Times Are a Changing 49 Don’t Think Twice
25 Masters Of War 50 World Gone Wrong
51. We Better Talk This Over 76. Lay Lady Lay
52. Chimes of Freedom 77. Silvio
53. Not Dark Yet 78.
54. My Back Pages 79. Forever Young
55. Wanted Man 80. Workin’ Man Blues
56. Positively Fourth Street 81. Where Teardrops Fall
57. I’m Not there 82. When The Deal Goes Down
58. Brownsville Girl 83. Mississippi
59. Where Are You Tonight 84. Tight Connection To My Heart
60. Girl From The North country 85. If Dogs Run Free
61. Silvio 86. Ballad in Plain D
62. We Better Talk This Over 87. Positively 4th Street
63. It Ain’t Me Babe 88. What Was It You Wanted
64. Sugar Baby 89. New Danville Girl
65. Nettie Moore 90. One Too Many Mornings
66. Up To Me 91. Mississippi
67. Ain’t Talkin’ 92. What’s A sweetheart Like You.
68. Up To Me 93. Girl From The North country
69. Hurricane 94. Changing of the Guard
70. She Belongs To Me 95. Senior
71. I Shall Be Free 96. She Belongs to Me
72. Cold Irons Bound 97. Silvio
73. 98. Hones With Me
74. Rollin’ & Tumblin’ 99. Rollin’ & Tumblin’
75. Like A Rolling Stone 100 Ballad of a Thin Man
101 Silvio 121 Rollin’ & Thunderin’
102 Tear of Rage 122 Chimes of Freedom
103 Mississippi 123 Too Much of Nothin’
104 Don’t Think Twice 124 Subterranean Homesick Blues
105 Brownsville Girl 125 Chimes of Freedom
106 No Time to Talk 126 Ain’t Talkin’
107 Mr. Tambourine Man 127 Like A Rollin’ Stone
108 Quinn The Eskimo 128 Sugar Baby
109 129 Sugar Baby
110 Blowin’ In The Wind 130 Brownsville Girl
111 Changing of the Guard 131 Ain’t No Righteous Man
112 Million Dollar Bash 132.
113 Brownsville Girl 133 Subterranean Homesick Blues
114 Subterranean Homesick Blues 134 What’s a Sweetheart Like You
115 Where Are You Tonight 135 Brownsville Girl
116 Like A Rolling Stone 136 If Not For You
117 All Along The Watchtower 137 Don’t Think Twice
118 Tom Thumb’s Blues 138 I’ll Keep It With Mine
119 Dark Eyes 139 No Time to Think
DYLAN QUOTE TEST # 1
120 Ain’t Talkin’
MATCH QUOTATIONS WITH SONG TITLES
QUOTES
1._____”If God is on our side, He’ll stop the next war.
2._____”And his brain has been mismanaged with great skill.
3._____”All right—where do you want this killing done?”
4._____”Is your money that good? Will it buy forgiveness? Do you think that it could?
5._____”Things are breaking up out there, high water everywhere.
6._____”Let’s disconnect the cables overturn the tables. This place just don’t make sense to me no more. Can you tell me what we are waiting for, Senor?”
7_____”May you have a strong foundation when the winds of changes shift.”
8_____”But you and I have been through that, and this is not our fate so let us not talk falsely the hour is getting late.”
9_____”I gaze into the doorway of temptations angry flames. And every time I pass that way I always hear my name.”
10. ___”Happiness is just a state of mind. Anytime you wish you can cross the state line.”
11_____”Before the sky there are no fences facing”
12_____”Something is happening here, but you don’t know what it is”
13_____”Ah, but I was so much older then I’m younger than that now”
14_____” strike another match, go start anew.”
15____”You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows”
16____”For he gets hurt will be he who has stalled”
17___”But to live outside the law, you must be honest”
18____”And I’ll tell it, and think it, and speak it and breathe it”
19_____”But it’s not that way, I wasn’t born to loose you.”
20_____”Kick your shoes off, do not fear, bring that bottle over here.”
21____”I’d just be curious to know if you can see yourself as clear as someone who has had you on his mind”
22_____”Goodbye is too good a word girl”
23_____”So many roads, so much at steak, so many dead ends, sometimes I wonder what it’s going to take to find dignity”
24______”It’s only other peoples games you got to dodge”
25____”Just remember when you are out there trying to heal the sick, that you must first forgive them.”
26_____”You’d know what a drag it is to see you.
27_____”You went to the finest school all right Miss Lonely. But you only used to get juiced in it”
28_____”I got sidetracked in El Paso, stopped to get myself a map, went the wrong way into Juarez with Juanita on my lap. Then I went to sleep in Shreveport, woke up in Abilene wondering why the hell I’m wanted at some town halfway between.”
29____”Bury the rag deep in your face, for now is the time for your tears”
30_____”That long black cloud is coming down. “
DYLAN TEST (TITLES #1)
THE SONG TITLES:
A. Wanted Man
B. My Back Pages
C. Masters of War
D. Dignity
E. I Want You
F. License To Kill
G. Waiting for You
H. Forever Young
I. Knockin’ On Heaven’s Door
J. Subterranean Homesick Blues
K. Momma You Been On My Mind
L. With God On Our Side
M. Absolutely Sweet Marie
N. Don’t Think Twice
O. Like A Rolling Stone
P. I’ll Be Your Baby Tonight
Q. High Water
R. Open the Door, Homer
S. Senor
T. Positively 4th Street
U. All Along The Watchtower
V. It’s All Right Ma
W. Hattie Caroll
X. The Times They Are A Changin’
Y. Mr. Tambourine Man
Z. Highway 61
*. Every Grain of Sand
**. It’s all Over Now Baby Blue
***. Hard Rain
****. Ballad of A Thin Man
DYLAN QUOTES TEST # ! (ANSWERS)
1. L
2. F
3. Z
4. C
5. Q
6. S
7. H
8. U
9. *
10. G
11. Y
12. ****
13. B
14 **
15. J
16. X
17. M
18 ***
19. E
20. P
21. K
22.N
23. D
24. V
25. R
26. T
27. O
28. A
29. W
30. I
DYLAN TEST 2 (QUOTES TO BE MATCHED )
——“May you have a strong foundation when the winds of changes shift.”
—- “Time is an ocean but it ends at the shore.”
——Happiness is just a state of mind. Any time you wish you can cross the state line.
——- Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth, None of them along the line know what any of it is worth.”
—But I can’t think for you, You’ll have to decide, Whether Judas Iscariot, Had God on his side.
—— Sometimes babies never learn.
—-Don’t criticize what you can’t understand.—
—-He who is not busy being born, Is busy dying.
—-I asked for salvation, But they gave me a lethal dose.
—-I got a cravin’ love for blazin’ speed, I got a hopped up Mustang Ford, Jump into the wagon, love, Throw your panties overboard.
—-I laugh and I cry and I’m haunted by, Things I never meant nor wished to say.
—-I think we better talk this over, Maybe when we both get sober.
—-I was so much older then, I’m younger then that now.
—-I ‘m trying to love my neighbor and do good unto others, But oh, mother, things ain’t going well.
—-In the dime stores and bus stations, People talk of situations, Read books, repeat quotations, Draw conclusion on the wall.
—- Lot of things can get in the way, when you’re tryin’ to do what’s right.
—-.—-Patriotism is the last refuse of a scoundrel.
—- Three miles north of purgatory – one step from the great beyond
I prayed to the cross and I kissed the girls and I crossed the Rubicon.
—-You won’t amount to much the people all said
‘Cause I didn’t play guitar behind my head
Never pandered never acted proud
Never took off my shoes and threw them into the crowd
Goodbye Jimmy Reed – goodbye and goodnight
I’ll put a jewel in your crown – I’ll put out the light.
—-Sometimes the silence can be like the thunder
Sometimes I wanna take to the road and plunder
—-They tell me everything is gonna be all right
But I don’t know what “all right” even means.
—- The storms are raging on the rolling sea
The winds of change are blowing wild and free
You ain’t seen nothing like me yet.
——Maybe somewhere down the road a ways (at the end of the line)
You’ll think of me and wonder where I am these days (at the end of the line)
Maybe somewhere down the road when somebody plays (at the end of the line)
Purple Haze.
—- I loved you then, and ever shall,
but there’s no one here who is left to tell.
The world has turned black before my eyes
DYLAN TEST 2—SONG TITLES
—-Happiness is just a state of mind. Any time you wish you can cross the state line.
——I don’t cheat on myself. I don’t run and hide.
Hide from the feelings that are buried inside.
2. NETTIE MOORE
3. WAITIN’ FOR YOU
4. RUBICON
5. FOREVER YOUNG
6. TRYING TO GET TO HEAVEN
7. IT’S ALRIGHT MA
8. WHEN THE DEAL GOES DOWN
9. END OF THE LINE
10. OH SISTER
11. BROWNSVILLE GILRL
12. MAN IN THE LONG BLACK COAT
13. AIN’T TALKIN’
14 WHERE TEARDROPS FALL
15. HIGHWATER
16. MY BACK PAGES
17. LOVE MINUS ZERO
18. LOVE SICK
19. THE TIMES ARE CHANGING
20. SWEETHEART LIKE YOU
21. GOODBY JIMMY REED.
22. ALL ALONG THE WATCHTOWER
23. WITH GOD ON OUR SIDE
24. MOST OF THE TIME
25. MAYBE WE BETTER TALK THIS OVER
DYLAN TEST 2 (answers)
5——“May you have a strong foundation when the winds of changes shift.”
10—- “Time is an ocean but it ends at the shore.”
25——Happiness is just a state of mind. Any time you wish you can cross the state line.
22——- Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth, None of them along the line know what any of it is worth.”
23—But I can’t think for you, You’ll have to decide, Whether Judas Iscariot, Had God on his side.
11—— Sometimes babies never learn.
19 —-Don’t criticize what you can’t understand.—-Funny, the things you have the hardest time parting with, are the things you need the least.
7—-He who is not busy being born, Is busy dying.
14—-Roses are red and violets are blue, time is beginning to crawl,
I may have to come see you, where teardrops fall.
15 —-I got a cravin’ love for blazin’ speed, I got a hopped up Mustang Ford, Jump into the wagon, love, Throw your panties overboard.
8—-I laugh and I cry and I’m haunted by, Things I never meant nor wished to say.
26—-I think we better talk this over, Maybe when we both get sober.
16—-I was so much older then, I’m younger then that now.
13—-I ‘m trying to love my neighbor and do good unto others, But oh, mother, things ain’t going well.
17—-In the dime stores and bus stations, People talk of situations, Read books, repeat quotations, Draw conclusion on the wall.
12——She never said nothing, there was nothing she wrote.
She’d gone with the man in the long black coat
.20—-Patriotism is the last refuse of a scoundrel.
4—- Three miles north of purgatory – one step from the great beyond
I prayed to the cross and I kissed the girls and I crossed the Rubicon.
21—-You won’t amount to much the people all said
‘Cause I didn’t play guitar behind my head
Never pandered never acted proud
Never took off my shoes and threw them into the crowd
Goodbye Jimmy Reed – goodbye and goodnight
I’ll put a jewel in your crown – I’ll put out the light.
18—-Sometimes the silence can be like the thunder
Sometimes I wanna take to the road and plunder
6—-They tell me everything is gonna be all right
But I don’t know what “all right” even means.
1—- The storms are raging on the rolling sea
The winds of change are blowing wild and free
You ain’t seen nothing like me yet.
9——Maybe somewhere down the road a ways (at the end of the line)
You’ll think of me and wonder where I am these days (at the end of the line)
Maybe somewhere down the road when somebody plays (at the end of the line)
Purple Haze.
2—- I loved you then, and ever shall,
but there’s no one here who is left to tell.
The world has turned black before my eyes
—-