Month: June 2012

Everyone else has a great Ray Bradbury story

My wife decided to re-read Fahrenheit 451 because she thought it was getting to be too close to prophecy.


Someone who knew Ray Bradbury, the writer who died last week, noted in Salon magazine: “Ray was the last living member of a “BACH” quartet — writers who transformed science fiction from a pulp magazine ghetto into a genre for hardcover bestsellers[, along with] Isaac Asimov, Arthur Clarke, and Robert Heinlein…”

My buddy Steve Bissette “heard the news of his passing as I drove… Instantly, a flood of memories—entire passages of Bradbury short stories I first read when I was 11 and 12, his novels, the movies from his tales—rushed through, and I had to turn off the radio to let them come. Ray made us all one of his ‘book people’ from FAHRENHEIT 451, I reckon… all I know is he changed my life, and (along with Lovecraft) instilled the desire to write, which I do every single day of my life.” He shared a link: Ray Bradbury- Story of a Writer (1963); “Bradbury in his prime—and when all the world, it seemed, was his oyster. The man until his death, and that is something more for all of us to aspire to.”

Here’s a story of Ray Bradbury spending three hours slathering the 15-year-old Mark Evanier with advice about writing. Neil Gaiman shares the story of an aspiring writer of age 11 or 12, getting the same kind of time and advice from Ray.

You can watch an hour of Bradbury addressing (mostly) new writers at the Sixth Annual Writer’s Symposium by the Sea in February of 2001. Or read tweets by celebrities.

And what do I have? Just a bunch of Bradbury-penned old episodes of Alfred Hitchcock, plus a classic Twilight Zone episode, which I saw before I even knew his name, and reading a bunch of his short stories, often seeing them adapted into other media.

Plus this: my wife decided to re-read Fahrenheit 451 because she thought it was getting to be too close to prophesy. She borrowed a book from a teaching colleague. But just before she finished it, she dropped the book into a mud puddle. So, separately, she and I bought replacement copies. We kept the one; seems like a book we ought to have on the shelf.

Scott Walker, Gray Davis: The Recall Question


Let me tell you a secret: I was not happy about the Wisconsin recall vote that attempted, unsuccessfully, to get rid of Governor Scott Walker. I’m not referring to the OUTCOME of the vote; I’m talking about having the vote in the first place. Walker was duly elected in 2010 for a four-year term and started fulfilling his campaign pledge to make draconian cuts to the budget and state personnel. Just a year into his term, a movement to unseat him began.

It reminded me of the California recall of Governor Gray Davis (pictured) in 2003, mere months after he was re-elected in 2002, tied to an electricity price crisis manipulated in part by the failed business, Enron. Davis was replaced by some actor from Austria.

It is said that the idea of recall is “pure democracy”, with the people able to right wrongs. Then why does it feel so undemocratic to me?

There has been a lot of talk about what the Wisconsin vote MEANS. It may not MEAN anything. “Folks were polled at 60 percent voting against this recall because they think leadership change ought to occur via regular elections and not recalls and that a majority of those polled voted against recall while still expressing supports for unions.”

It seems to me that one should limit the recall to an official who has committed a grievous crime or betrayed the office in some way. New York, which not have the recall option, managed to get rid of its governor, Eliot Spitzer, through threats of legal action after his prostitution addiction came to light.

And the propositions that are allowed on the ballot in California seem to contradict each other every other year, making it an even more difficult state to govern.

The Wisconsin situation does show, yet again, how much money controls politics more than ever before, and that is most unhealthy for democracy, as the person in this video suggests.

But what say you?

 

Geek Confessional

Obsessions with vampires, zombies, LOLcats, Facebook games such as Castleville, which female celebrities are pregnant or just had a baby…


Jaquandor addresses: “What is something you absolutely hate or love or just don’t get, or maybe it’s something you have never even seen or read. What is your deepest, darkest geek confession?”

The breakdown:

Something I hate that everybody else loves.

Does EVERYBODY love ANYTHING anymore? I mean someone is watching those Real Housewives shows, and I despise their very existence, but they are quite avoidable.

The closest thing, I suppose, to the nature of the question is The Big Bang Theory. I watched it, didn’t HATE it, but didn’t find it particularly funny either. And I am convinced it was the laugh track. When I’m not chuckling, and “they” are, it’s quite telling to me.

Something I love that everybody else hates.

Watches. Something that has only one function – to tell time. Actually, I don’t have one presently – it died – but I’m in the market for one.

Physical music. Everything is downloaded or in “the cloud”, whatever that is. I still like the tactile sense. I like reading the liner notes.

Physical books. I tell you that, with some reference books, I can find reliable information a lot faster than by Googling it. (Note the term “reliable.”)

Bicycles. Some drivers are just hostile to the notion of sharing the road.

Something I don’t get that everyone else seems to:

Obsessions with vampires, zombies, LOLcats, Facebook games such as Castleville, in which female celebrities are pregnant or just had a baby (and they keep track of their children’s names), or how quickly they’ve gotten rid of their baby fat. (Look at the most popular baby names, and you’ll find lots of kids of celebrities with those names – but don’t ask me which celebs.)

Something that you would think I’m familiar with and yet am not:

I suppose I should go with the big one: Harry Potter. Never read one book; didn’t even start one, only to give up. Did see the first movie, and thought it was OK, but never went beyond that.

Any number of TV shows: Mad Men, The Sopranos (I’ve seen maybe six minutes of it), Breaking Bad, The Wire…the list goes on and on.

Music by The Decemberists, Florence + the Machine, pretty much all of the 21st-century music, though I actually have a Black Keys album. There was a category on current pop music on the last JEOPARDY! Teen Tournament and I went 0 for 5.

The Blind Person Rule

Another source of irritation occurs when one of my neighbors parks his car so that it totally blocks the sidewalk, forcing one to either walk in the street or squeeze between this car and the other car in the driveway.

One of the rules I try to enforce in our household is to not have anything on the floor where someone – mostly likely, me – might trip over it at night when the lights are out. Makes sense, right? I have tried to apply that idea to my sidewalk and walkways. No unnecessary debris, such as branches. It is obvious, however, that not everyone shares my zeal.

I may have told this story before, but, years later, it still irritates me. Sometime in the past decade, a blind man was walking across Madison Avenue in Albany from the corner nearest the police station to the corner where the Bruegger’s bagel shop was/is located. He was doing fine until he almost walked into a car that had totally blocked the crosswalk. The driver of the car, as you might guess, was inside the Bruegger’s picking up some food. I’m sure he was thinking, “I’ll only be a minute.” But it was disruptive to the pedestrian, who felt his way around the car and finally made his way to the sidewalk. And it was frustrating to me, who was far enough up North Allen that I could not help him, or even yell to him coherently.

I was also roiled because there was a real parking spot about three car lengths away. Moving there was obviously too onerous for the driver to do. Unfortunately, he drove away before either seeing the disruption he caused or before I could reach him to (probably unkindly) inform him of his bête noire.

Another source of irritation occurs when one of my neighbors parks his car so that it totally blocks the sidewalk, forcing one to either walk in the street or squeeze between this car and the other car in the driveway. This has happened more than once. This situation could have avoided if the first car in the driveway had pulled in farther. The problem is amplified when there are snowbanks on the grass, especially when trying to use a shopping cart. This is frustrating for a sighted person; imagine how much more frustrating it would be to one who is not.

So keep your walkways free of debris, ice, snow, and vehicles. That includes bicycles, such as the one I saw lying in the middle of the sidewalk in front of a food establishment on Lark Street a while back. Think about how you would fare there if you could not see.

I do not usually understand “I’m bored”

This is not to say that I’m never bored. Trapped in someone else’s time frame WILL bore me silly. In a long meeting that is top down?

I was reading on Facebook about some actual acquaintance of mine whose family was out of town for the weekend. He was expressing how lonely and bored he was, as he didn’t know what to do with himself. I thought it was rather sweet and endearing, actually.

Still, I also found it odd. On those rare occasions that my wife takes The Daughter to visit the grandparents, I miss them. But I always have a litany of things to read, watch and/or listen to, and other projects. I am never bored by my own company, probably a function of living alone more than half my adult life.

This is not to say that I’m never bored. Trapped in someone else’s time frame WILL bore me silly. In a long meeting that is top-down? A yawn; Presbyterians have LOTS of meetings, which I avoid as much as possible. Stuck three hours in Wal-Mart (and it HAS happened)? REALLY boring – it’s shopping, which I dislike, and it’s Wal-Mart, which I’m not fond of. The only way that situation would have been salvageable is if I had had something to read and a place to sit down and read it. IF there’s something to read, AND I have the opportunity to do so, I am NEVER bored.

When, if ever, are you bored?

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