String Theory

The 5th Season of the String Theory at the Hunter Museum started tonight.  The Brentano String Quartet led off the series with pieces by Mendelssohn and Dvorak.  Fabulous!  We are so lucky to have this series and get musicians of this caliber.

Exciting!

It is so exciting to watch the International Space Station fly over your house.  It just sails up there so evenly and steadily.  And it's amazing to know that there are people in that little speck of light.

Click here to find when the ISS will be visible in your area (cloud cover permitting).  You can even sign up and get e-mail notifications as to when it will be in your neighborhood.

(This is not one of our photographs and not in Tennessee - taken from Google Images)

Tuesday haiku

 

Two parties today.

Saying farewell, swimming friend.

Hi, basketball coach.

Ruth Benerito (and other stuff)

My previously unknown heroine!

Ruth Benerito died today at age 97 in LA. Until today, I'd never heard of her or that she was one of my heroes. She invented permanent press. Anyone who knows me knows how I feel about ironing - and that I stopped ironing as soon as permanent press was invented and I could replace all our clothes. This previously unknown savior contributed a large benefit to my life. Click here for the Wikipedia site and click here for a Slate obituary about her.
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Why do so many of the police procedural programs (the ones we watch regularly) feel they have to have a continuing psychopathic killer that goes on for many episodes and even seasons? These really turn me off and I’m about to stop watching them for that reason. These include Bones, The Mentalist, Person of Interest, and probably others. It looks like Bones might have finally gotten rid of the one on that problem, but who knows. Anyhow. I really wish they’d get rid of these story lines.
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I spent a quick hour this morning at the oral surgeon’s getting an upper back tooth removed. I don’t remember much about it - love that light IV anesthesia plus an Atavan. I’ve been taking my pain meds, drinking milkshakes for nutrition, and sleeping. All that seems to be working well. We’ll see how I feel tomorrow.

Happy Birthday, Margaret

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MARGARET!

Bridge (the game)

Harriet, I’m sorry you’ve had a bad experience playing bridge. It is one of the few (if not the only) card game where luck isn’t the determining factor. Yes, of course, you can’t do much if you don’t get good cards, but you also can’t win if you don’t make the most of the cards you have.

Contract is the “basic” bridge game, and is played by any group of four people, playing as two teams. It’s a game of communication, done within a set of rules. If there are two or more tables playing, the scores are based on what each pair can make on each deal, and no two deals will be the same throughout the playing time.

In duplicate bridge, the cards are dealt ahead of time and placed into racks (called boards), the hands are kept separate during play, and returned to the board after the hand is played. The boards will be passed around, so that each pair will play the same cards that other pairs have played. This way the scores are a reflection of how one pair does against another playing the same hand.

The rules of bidding and play are the same in each game, the differences are in the scoring and in the fact that pairs are all playing different hands in contract bridge, and playing the same hands in duplicate.

I hope that makes some sense. Again, Harriet, I’m sorry you’ve had less-than-optimum experiences. With your analytical mind, you ought to be a good player. And one learns by playing with people who are better players. We like to help less experienced players gain experience - it‘s the only way to get better. And, otherwise how do we get new players to play with.

Duplicate

We played duplicate bridge tonight.  We had played once before, but it was probably at least 30 years ago.  This was a small (3 tables tonight), low-key group.  We knew about half the people there.  We came in a "close third" for the evening.  We bid and made a slam the first hand, so that was a nice beginning. It was a nice group, and I guess we'll be going back. 

From Wordsmith

One of my daily internet stops is A Word A Day from Wordsmith.  He picks a word, usually with a theme for the week, gives the pronunciation, derivation, and definition of the word.  Then the Wordsmith gives one or two quotes using the word.  He closes the page with a Thought for the Day.  The Thoughts are from a variety of sources and frequently are related to the news of the day.  His Thoughts for this week, in the wake of the government closure as a result of the radical right Republicans, were worth repeating.

Ultimately, the only power to which man should aspire is that which he exercises over himself. -Elie Wiesel, writer, Nobel laureate (b. 1928)

A strong nation, like a strong person, can afford to be gentle, firm, thoughtful, and restrained. It can afford to extend a helping hand to others. It is a weak nation, like a weak person, that must behave with bluster and boasting and rashness and other signs of insecurity. -Jimmy Carter, 39th US President, Nobel laureate (b. 1924)

When I despair, I remember that all through history, the way of truth and love has always won. There have been murderers and tyrants, and for a time they can seem invincible. But in the end they always fall. Think of it, always. -Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (1869-1948)

The corporate grip on opinion in the United States is one of the wonders of the Western world. No First World country has ever managed to eliminate so entirely from its media all objectivity -- much less dissent. -Gore Vidal, author (1925-2012)

Manners are a sensitive awareness of the feelings of others. If you have that awareness, you have good manners, no matter what fork you use. -Emily Post, author and columnist (1872-1960)



　

Silence

Fall from Green's View, Sewanee, TN

Chapter 2

Lowe’s sent the installer. He came this afternoon, and his first comment was that guys who work with the warranty always want to blame things on the installer. But he pressed on.

His comment was that the dishwasher had been installed the same way the previous one had been. The new one had worked for a year, and the old one had worked for a long time without the non-drainage problem. Now, for some reason, it was plugging up.

He made a new drainage path with the re-installation and said that this was probably the way it should’ve been done in the first place, but…..

Anyhow, it’s now supposed to work. I’m filling it up with dirty dishes and we shall see.

The saga of the dishwasher

I got a new dishwasher at Lowe’s in midSeptember last year - not a top of the line model, but not the bottom, either.

In August, it didn’t drain. We were just heading out of town, and John fiddled with it and got it to drain, so we let it go. Then, just at a year from the purchase date (but not the installation date), it quit draining again. This time I called Lowe’s to see about getting it fixed.

After several phone calls and five more days, Frigidaire agreed to do a service call under the one-year warranty. Hooray for Frigidaire! The appointment was made and the service guy came this afternoon.

He got the dishwasher out and rummaged around with its innards. And then told us that it wasn’t draining because…… It wasn’t installed properly!!!

He couldn’t fix it under the warranty because it wasn’t a problem with the machine, and he charged us only for the service call. John asked him to put in writing on the invoice that the problem had been with the installation. Then John called Lowe’s, told them about the problem, and asked what they were going to do to make it right. They’re to have an installer get in touch with us.

So in the meantime, I still don’t have a functional dishwasher. Stay tuned……

It's nuts!

 

 

How can these nitwits

Do this to the voters? It’s

Absolutely nuts!

Weekend stuff

Margaret came by yesterday and spent the night. It was good to see her, and she brought some lovely green beans and tomatoes. We're always glad to get the produce. We ate dinner with friends last night - Margaret got here in time to go with us. It was an easy meal of meatloaf and baked potatoes, so not a problem - and Margaret's known them for a while, too.

We went over to see Allan this afternoon. John's been going most days to walk with him, but I haven't seen him. It was good to get a chance to get back in touch with him - even though I hate seeing him so weak. He has his second chemo treatment this coming Friday. It’s tough stuff to deal with, but he’s fighting.

Lots of stuff coming up for the week - should be a busy one.

Last Saturday in September

A quiet weekend,

Margaret came, dinner at

Carol and Stephen’s.
 

Otherwise, it was

Football, football, football, and

Even more football.

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Dental visits

I spent most of the morning in various dental offices. My regular dentist started on my tooth (back upper left), with the numbing and drilling, etc. Then he stopped and got another x-ray to be sure about the amount of decay. After reviewing the film, he said that there was more decay than he had hoped, and that it was going to call for a crown or maybe a root canal or just to lose the tooth. I had thought about this before, and decided that if those were my options, I was just going to lose the tooth. I told him that since it was a back tooth, and I was 77 years old, that I had decided earlier that I would just have it removed. He agreed, and sent me to the oral surgeon in an adjoining building.

I saw the surgeon and got a brief oral exam and conversation. My appointment is for ten days, and he'll do it with a light anesthesia. John will need to come with me to drive, but it sounds fairly straightforward. And so it goes.

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The America's Cup

A few weeks ago, John started watching the preliminary qualifying races for the America’s Cup. New Zealand boat won the opportunity to challenge the defending champion, the US boat. And I got sucked in to watch it, too.

This race is actually a series of races, with the winner being the first one to win nine races. The boats are incredible catamarans, with crews of about a dozen men. There are two very tall “sails”, and they look like no sailboat you’ve ever seen before.

As the races went on, it seemed like New Zealand was giving the US sailing lessons. And soon New Zealand was ahead 8-1. Obviously, the Kiwis were quickly going to put the Yanks out of their misery. But then amazing things started to happen. The US started to win races.

Every day the Yanks got better and better, and kept winning. Tuesday, New Zealand was ahead 8-6 at the start of the day. Wind conditions were such that they were able to run both races, and by the end of the day, the boats were tied at 8 to 8.

So today, there was only one race - the one for all the marbles. And amazingly, the US won it, going away. New Zealand was never even close. What an exciting come-from-WAY-behind win.

Nobody’s ever paid much attention to the America’s Cup, but that will certainly change - if this type of competition and coverage continues. Just wait until next year.

Banned Book Week (22-28 September)

I mentioned Banned Book Week a few days ago.  Today, Bev Sykes posted her blog on Banned Book Week on her blog, Airy Persiflage.  She, as always, hits the nail right on the head.  I'm going to quote her today (Thanks, Bev!).
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This is "Read a Banned Book" Week (Sept. 22-28), an annual event celebrating the freedom to read.  It focuses on efforts across the country to remove certain books from libraries and schools because some people find them offensive.

Who are these people and don't they have anything better to do?  A list of America's most surprising banned books include such books as "The Diary of Anne Frank," for sexually explicit passages, and in 1983 the Alabama State Textbook Committee banned it because it was "a real downer."

A specific illustrated book of "Little Red Riding Hood" was banned because the young girl is shown carrying wine in her basket of goodies for Grandma and rather than seeing the message that children should not talk to strangers, school officials in Culver City, CA saw the book's message as "alcohol is yummy."   The LA Times reported that "After reviewing the award-winning book from the state-recommended reading list for first-graders, Culver City Unified School District officials concluded that its message conflicted with the anti-drug and -alcohol theme they promote in the classroom."

"Hansel and Gretel" was banned because it "gives witches a bad name."

In 1952, "Charlotte's Web" was banned in Kansas because it was felt that humans are the highest level of God's creation and so any book featuring talking animals must be the work of the devil.  They felt it was sacrilegious and disrespectful of God.

And who would ever think that "Where's Waldo" would appear on a banned book list, but it does.  It was banned in Michigan and New York because there was "a sunbathing woman suffering a wardrobe malfunction the size of a pinhead in a corner of one of Martin Hanford's drawings."

Who is so dedicated to smut eradication that they would examine every page of a Waldo book to find something objectionable, and ban a book based on such a teeny tiny drawing.

The top banned children's book in the last decade is a book called "The What's Happening to My Body? Book for Boys," deemed inappropriate and banned in 21 school libraries in Texas, following a 2010 complaint by the father of an 8 year old who was shocked that his son could see this book. (I wonder if this Dad has taught his young son how to shoot a gun...?)

Even the dictionary is not free from complaint. School administrators in Alaska have banned both the American Heritage Dictionary and the Merriam Webster dictionary in schools and libraries for its "objectionable" entries — particularly slang words, including "bed," "knocker," and "balls."

I checked the list of books that are frequently challenged or banned.   They include books like "The Great Gatsby," "Catcher in the Rye," "To Kill a Mockingbird," "The Grapes of Wrath," "Beloved," "Of Mice and Men," "Farewell to Arms," "Gone with the Wind," "Call of the Wild," "Lord of the Rings," "Sophie's Choice," "Brave New World," "One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest," "The Sun Also Rises," and a host of others.  (You can read the reasons why these books were banned here.)

 

I feel positively wicked...I think I have read every single one of those books.

Do yourself a favor and flout convention...read a banned book this week.

The usual Monday chaos, but....

Mondays are chaotic - lots going on every morning, and then bridge in the afternoon.

But, I did have some cards today.  I was in the winning pair in each progression (although it doesn't necessarily follow that I was high for the day).  And we have found a group that plays duplicate and I think we're going to give it a try.  We shall see....

p.s.  This is not one of my hands - just a bridge hand from google images.

There's fall in the air

Rainy Saturday in Fall

 

 

First rain this month. Gray

All day. It made for a good

Day for football, naps.