There’s something to be said for reading over other means of ingesting information, as long as we follow Daniel Boortsin’s advice, that we “Classify, make inferences, reason, and practice, practice, practice.” Other forms of receipt of information are less useful:

Television and other electronic forms: I created, not intentionally but rather by blurting a while back, a bit at a kerfuffle at a family gathering when someone mentioned some news item, and I observed that the effects of television news were not just belief, but instant belief. From there I was castigated with the usually defensive nonsense, that people get “news” from more than one source, that the Wall Street Journal is reliable, and that no one really takes TV news seriously anyway. A grandson mentioned reading something, and I said reactively to the overall tone of rebuke that “Paper doesn’t refuse ink”, which brought about laughter. That’s a saying I remember via my mother from my grandmother, a school teacher.

Continue reading “The age of enlightenment begins, 8/6/1945” →

Last Friday I was washing windows. In our dining room we have four windows that are too high to reach, and require an extension ladder. I have one of those, and old one, but functional. The problem with it is sharp corners, as I learned that day.

I remember fixing a toilet in the last few years and in a tight space where it is so hard to reach the seat bolts. I have a power wrench that comes in handy, and so used it to reach the back bolts that were otherwise hard to get at, and I let one go too long and the entire toilet fell apart before my eyes. Ceramic will do that. Months later I related this story to my cousin’s husband, and he said “You never want to use a power tool on a toilet.” That was such obvious advice that I wanted to slap him, but instead I said “Now you tell me.” (I like the guy. He’s a musician, a piano/horn player, and a really good one. Deep inside I want to be a musician. They tried to recruit me for my singing voice in high school. I regret turning them down. It never occurred to me to say yes.)

Continue reading “Senior citizen tales” →

I decided that I have to let the last post go, as doing more work on it is pointless. As it is, when I do face splits, it is very rare to get any alignment at all, but when the eyes, nose, mouth and head shape all line up, it is a bingo in my book. What about plastic surgery? They can’t do much, but they can do some. With Bill Hicks, for instance, it was apparent that they inserted a piece of plastic or something in the nose to straighten it out. But the nose was still in the exact same location on his face. They cannot change that. They cannot change the shape of the skull or location of the eyes, most critical in making comparisons. They cannot raise or lower ears – they can only tuck them.

What about when a person ages? It does not change alignment of features. They are hardwired in our skulls. Fat accumulates in eye sockets, ears elongate, chins double and then triple, but it is the same face underneath.

With Sam Cooke I found what clearly was a set of twins, and set it up as follows, one photo of Twin #1 superimposed on five of the other:

None of them align! In fact, the all misalign in the very same manner. What does that mean? It’s easy: Two of them.

Continue reading “Iksrakot” →

I am going to talk about something that I’ve never written about before, but to preface the remarks, it’s not private, and though it was at that time of my life, it is not important.

It has to do with becoming a CPA, and what it takes. At the time I passed the exam, in the early 1980s, it was a completely bluebook pencil-driven affair. We answered multiple choice questions; we wrote essays; and solved long problems in a show-your-work style.

It was my understanding at that time that only five percent of candidates did as I did, and passed all five parts on first attempt. I’ll get that part out of the way, in the “what it says about me” department. One, it means I’m pretty smart, at accounting anyway. I’m not terribly smart in many ways. But more than that, it says that I knew how to take a test. I didn’t sweat it, never sweated tests in college, and yet, for sure, I did not ace them all, not even close.  I was not an A student. However, I was always relaxed, and on tests usually done before everyone else and busy checking and rechecking my work. Some people I knew sweated and panicked. Even though they were smart and capable they were not good at testing. That’s a shame. There should be a better way for those who study hard, have the knowledge, but do not test well. I do not know the answer there.

Continue reading “Bouncing off rocks, landing in a beautiful pool” →

While we were vacationing in France, I had the pleasure of meeting Jan Spreen, an occasional commenter here. He allowed me to publish a couple of his pieces, here and here, while we traveled, and I have put his blog up on the blogroll. I advise caution, however, as much of his blog is written in French, and those French, as Steve Martin once reminded us, “have a different word for everything.”

Jan and I discussed books of importance, and I told him that I have a problem with retention, that I had read many book and that after I remembered nothing. This came to the fore this year when I put great effort in transcribing portions of the book Public Opinion, by Walter Lippman. I use 3m flags to highlight important passages, and then use a transcription program to read those passages into a Word file. I have accumulated scores of such files, and I occasionally consult them.

I have too many books and not enough space, and so was thinning them out and selecting many to give away to our local Community Nest. Or to toss. I came across another copy of Public Opinion. I had flagged that copy as I had the other, but had not transcribed it. I then realized that I had read and flagged the book twice, transcribed portions once, and not retained a word of it!

Continue reading “Yellow highlighters and the art of memory maintenance” →

A Short Story
Twenty-First Century Love
Jan Spreen
https://janspreen.com

1 – A conference
Some time ago I’ve been listening to a very interesting conference about the HIV=AIDS equation. Two of the most important speakers were Dr Chermann, member of the Prof. Luc Montagnier research team in the 1980ies and co-discoverer of the left part of the equation, as he likes to call himself, and Dr de Harven, professor of pathology and director of a Canadian electron microscope laboratory during the 80s, who doesn’t agree at all with the currently admitted HIV and AIDS concept.

Dr Chermann was the first to speak, and he told us a lot of things. For instance, he explained that the famous virus is very difficult to track, because it changes all the time.

He even thinks that all beings might have a different virus. Trying to imagine the difficulties arising when somebody attempts to discover an unknown virus in these circumstances, it became clear to me that his team must have been composed of very talented people indeed. But I started to feel really excited when he pointed out to us the reason why sometimes a virus cannot be found, even if a person was tested HIV positive. In that case, Dr Chermann explained, the viruses are pooling in a place where they cannot be detected. And he simply added: the fact that a virus cannot be seen doesn’t mean that it’s not there.

Continue reading “Twenty-First Century Love” →

We are going on a three-week trip, first to Algarve on the southern Atlantic coast of Portugal, and then to the island of Madeira, a Portuguese “possession?” closest to Morocco. From there we head to Geneva, or thereabouts, to visit our daughter, who will take us on a tour ot southern France. She’s an excellent tour guide and fun traveling companion.

In the past in our travels I have strived to avoid making this blog a travelogue, as in visiting new places I know less than anyone there. I need to just observe and be quiet. I have stumbled on matters that became thrilling blog content, as with the crypt of Eva Peron in Buenos Aires, Argentina, leading to the discovery of her fake death and married life in Michigan, producing a daughter we came to know as the pop singer Madonna, explaining both her fame despite lack of talent at once.

Continue reading “A treat in store …” →

“It is no random accident that most U.S. presidents have pet dogs in the White House, at considerable taxpayer expense for damaged rugs, furniture and draperies. Consciously and unconsciously , the presence a of loving , obedient, trusting dog produces a positive image of the owner. The president must have a dog. Voters would reject a politician who preferred cats, pigs, boa constrictors, or chimpanzees. (Wilson Bryan Key, The Age of Manipulation, p 134)

Cats, however, are their own creatures. They aren’t social or hierarchical (except in passing). They are only semi-domesticated. They don’t do tricks. They are friendly on their own terms. Dogs have been tamed, but cats have made a decision. They appear willing to interact with people, for some strange reason of their own. To me, cats are a manifestation of nature, of Being, in an almost pure form. Furthermore, they are a form of Being that looks at human beings and approves. (Jordan B. Peterson, 12 Rules for Life, Page 352) Continue reading “Wilson Bryan Key analyzes, Jordan B. Peterson anthropomorphizes” →