Tag Archives: humor

“Be Well, John Spartan”

[Movie quote: Sandra Bullock to Sylvester Stallone in Demolition Man, 1993]

Today was a high pain level day. Depending on many things, my arthritis can range from annoying to debilitating. It was rather higher on the scale today than desired, so I stayed home. I was scheduled to work with my author friend, helping him to stay motivated while he writes his book. I sent him a text to not expect me to show up at the usual time. He responded with “feel better.”

While I understood what his intent was (that I should reach a point in life where I was in less agony) his choice of words offers just the opposite request. To feel “better” would suggest being able to feel more effectively, thus experiencing pain with more clarity and intensity. After all, when we express the idea of practicing a musical instrument (for example) to get “better” we desire to be more skilled and proficient in our playing. Since my friend’s desire was that I didn’t hurt so much, he would have expressed it more clearly by desiring me to “feel [pain] worse.”

No wonder English is so hard for people to learn as a second language. It has much that doesn’t make sense and has nearly as many exceptions as rules. My favorite is

I before E

Except after C

Or when sounding like A

As in neighbor or weigh

Or whenever it damn well feels like it.

(Technically the last line doesn’t belong, but I add it in ’cause it’s true!)

I found I never really understood English until after I had taken a foreign language for a while (Greek in my case). It was only after seeing how a sensible language worked that I was able to work my way through the morass of foibles that makes up my common tongue (I often claim English to be my second language, but I hardly speak gibberish anymore).

So, it seems highly unlikely that the movie quote request is for Stallone’s character to act as a source of oil, water, or natural gas as the words might suggest.

Although there IS a Taco Bell in the movie, so maybe the gas…

Phred

post 47 of n

Cross Your Ladders And Knock On A Black Cat

Friday was the second thirteenth of the year (yes, this post is late. It’s my fault I have been sick and the official “blame someone else day” occurs on the FIRST FTT of the year) and for many people it is a day of consternation and concern. Stevie Wonder music not withstanding, many (perhaps most) people manifest symptoms of superstition.

It is the season of beards (hockey playoffs start shortly) and “lucky socks” (and other articles of clothing). March Madness brackets are out so there are thousands of supporters performing the magical actions needed to insure their team is victorious. Players slap the appropriate spot on the trip from the locker room to the field, cryptic incantations invoke the proper deities of the opposing teams for good and for evil. Scantily clad supplicants gyrate before the masses to build up the required frenzy for the coming slaughter…er, game.

Triskaidekaphobics have their own cause for concern. Just surviving the day will be challenging enough. And November has that whole election thing disrupting their lives, not just the usual Friday fright. Broken mirrors, ominous odors and malevolent observations cascading together to bring horror to the susceptible.

What many (perhaps most) fail to understand is that because events occur in sequence does not necessarily mean they are related in a causal relationship. If the sun rises on the same day you are involved in a car accident, it is (probably) not reasonable to assert the sunrise caused the accident (especially if it happened on the way home near midnight). Cause and effect is vastly more difficult to connect than simply observing my team wins more often if I neglect to brush my teeth on game days. (Both events might occur concurrently, but it is unreasonable to assert causality!)  There has to be a reason.

“Do you know,” said Prak, “the story of the Reason?”
Arthur said that he didn’t, and Prak said that he knew that he didn’t
He told it.
One night, he said, a spaceship appeared in the sky of a planet which had never seen one before. The planet was Dalforsas, the ship was this one. It appeared as a brilliant new star moving silently across the heavens.
Primitive tribesmen who were sitting huddled on the Cold Hillsides looked up from their steaming night-drinks and pointed with trembling fingers, swearing that they had seen a sign, a sign from their gods which meant that they must now arise at last and go and slay the evil Princes of the Plains.
In the high turrets of their palaces, the Princes of the Plains looked up and saw the shining star, and received it unmistakably as a sign from their gods that they must now go and set about the accursed Tribesmen of the Cold Hillsides.
And between them, the Dwellers in the Forest looked up into the sky and saw the sigh of the new star, and saw it with fear and apprehension, for though they had never seen anything like it before, they too knew precisely what it foreshadowed, and they bowed their heads in despair.
They knew that when the rains came, it was a sign.
When the rains departed, it was a sign.
When the winds rose, it was a sign.
When the winds fell, it was a sign.
When in the land there was born at midnight of a full moon a goat with three heads, that was a sign.
When in the land there was born at some time in the afternoon a perfectly normal cat or pig with no birth complications at all, or even just a child with a retrousse nose, that too would often be taken as a sign.
So there was no doubt at all that a new star in the sky was a sign of a particularly spectacular order.
And each new sign signified the same thing – that the Princes of the Plains and the Tribesmen of the Cold Hillsides were about to beat the hell out of each other again.
This in itself wouldn’t be so bad, except that the Princes of the Plains and the Tribesmen of the Cold Hillsides always elected to beat the hell out of each other in the Forest, and it was always the Dwellers in the Forest who came off worst in these exchanges, though as far as they could see it never had anything to do with them.
      Douglas Adams, Life, the Universe, and Everything, Chapter 34

Many (perhaps most) should know better. Especially with the explosion of information and technology, we should be beyond whistling in the dark to keep evil away, pronouncing blessing after a sneeze to prevent the person’s soul from escaping, and performing ritualistic actions of knocking on wood, crossing fingers, or fondling dead animal limbs to influence the world to form more to our liking. We might not know everything (like Prak) but we certainly know more than our unenlightened ancestors did. We can use our wisdom to overcome the blind adherence to ancient ways of thinking. Prak was spot on regarding one thing…

Most of the good bits were about frogs.

Phred

Post 33 of n

Protext Is Everything

Good evening ladies and  gentlemen, this is your captain typing. I’d like to thank you for traveling with us on this trip. While checking the conditions preflight, I have been told there might be some turbulence ahead, so it is suggested your remain in your seats with your seat belt adjusted comfortably. We will try to make this trip a safe and comfortable one.

Communication is broadly defined as an attempt to transfer an idea from one mind into another. In the direct context of our foray here the method is to come up with words that will create in the minds of the readers the same images and ideas in my own head. This task is significantly easier when it involves the spoken word presented in person in conversation. The presenter can gather visual clues about the level of understanding and can obtain feedback in the form of questions for additional information or insight. Subtle shades of meaning can be provided by voice inflection and phrasing. Emphasis a single word can modify or invert the meaning of a phrase in ways nearly impossible for written text to convey (one team I worked with would change the colours of text to help show emotional charge in messages sent, red for anger, blue for indifference, green for sarcasm). In this medium, we are constrained to simply word choice and text format to attempt to convey meaning.

A hindrance that is ever present is the lack of shared experience as a base of understanding. Even the assumption of a shared language (English…I pity the non-native speakers attempting to use a translation software program to try and make clear my blogs) is insufficient to assure the successful transfer of the desired idea. In a $99 workshop taken at a Holiday Inn hotel many years ago, we listed nearly 40 meanings for the word “hog” (proper, common, and slang uses) and nearly every expression can have multiple meanings. [Editor note: the word “foray” in the second paragraph was checked in a dictionary to make sure it carried the desired “flavor”…and the third definition matched what was expected: an initial venture. To my surprise, the first two meanings, “a quick raid, usually for the purpose of taking plunder,” and “a quick, sudden attack” were totally off my original intention. My apologies if your initial read caused you to bar the door against marauding Vikings. Information from dictionary.com]

Now for the title. (Yes, my spell checker is protesting protext is not really a word, too.) I should use the word context, but there is a flaw in this word as it is written, the prefix ‘con.’ We use the words pro and con, understanding that they have opposing meanings. A person uses the word pro in places where they are in agreement with or approving of an idea or proposition. The word con carries opposition and resistance to the topic in view So to use a word in “con-text” is to disagree with or protest its use as appropriate. This seems like an anti-effective way to start an attempt af understanding.

=[TURBULENCE WARNING] Then, the same dictionary site lists the prefix actually derives from a word com (not con). More red underlines from my spell checker when typing comtext. And con (or com…) means both opposing and together in Latin, depending on usage. I think I will quit using a dictionary.

So, in an attempt to land this puppy safely and smoothly, I will try to express my main thought with clarity, simplicity, and in the best way I know how, that you the reader will form an image in your mind as closely as possible with me. Ready?

I like pie.

[I like pi, too, but that will have to wait for the day of the century posting on 3.14.15]

Phred

post 31 of n

I’ve Created A (Sandstone) Monster

Apparently I am still a little kid at the core. I have succumb to peer pressure and done something that I vowed I would never do. It was a direct result of oppressive, unrelenting torment by several of my closest “friends” that compelled me to change my position and leap into a potentially damaging and addictive activity (against my considered, and better judgement).

I have become a player of MineCraft™.

Oh, the horror of it all. To think, just today rather than spending time working on my writing projects (including this blog) or taking time to attend to the basic housekeeping activities that are needed, I spent the afternoon building components to outfit my laboratory. Instead of reading recipes for cooking the pork loin I purchased for dinner tomorrow, I poured over recipes to create sheers from iron ingots and beds from wooden slats and wool (which was what the sheers were needed for in the first place). I haven’t removed the debris from around my apartment but cleared the vegetation from around my hovel (and quickly ran inside as the skeletons approached).

Now, in my defense, I was persuaded to take up this activity as a socializing event with others from my circle of influence. Last evening there were five of us working at the same time and chatting to one another while playing. We were separated by over a dozen miles between each of us, so we would not have been able to meet for socializing were we required to travel to a common location. Being in a mine was a socially stimulating activity that brought utility to each of us.

But the darker side of addiction surfaced today. After awaking from my nap (triggered in part by the onset of Daylight Saving Time this morning), my intent was to check my e-mail inbox and blog stats and then post a segment. Bad idea, since the first e-mail message I read described how the owner of the MC server had just installed a Mumble server to allow easier chatting while we were playing, and requested someone to try it out. And I did…losing about 4 hours of productive daylight. While I setup my client to talk, I linked into the world to check if anyone else was there (nope, but that didn’t stop me from working a while). One thing led to another and next thing I knew, I looked like I could do a body double for Castaway (except  that I would need to lose about 170 pounds and grow many more muscles to match Mr. Hank’s physique).

Step 1. Admit I have a problem… no, I can quit anytime.. Tell you what, I will look and see if there is anyone on and get back to you…

Phred

post 29 of n

Birthday Candle Induced COPD

Birthday celebrations carry different levels of significance depending on your age. When you are celebrating your first one, you couldn’t care less. You have no idea why today is any different than yesterday. Mom and Dad are making a big fuss, as are almost everyone else in the room (an older sibling might be “fitching a pit” because they are not getting enough attention, but this, too, will pass). B-day 2 is slightly more important, probably because of the lead up excitement tends to carry over. You will have developed some understanding of the patterns of life and might notice today is different somehow. And there’s cake. Then you go to bed and life continues pretty much as before.

The bar gets set higher each year for the next half dozen or so, then seems to level out. Oh, it’s a great day, your B-day, but now it’s not necessarily the high point of your year (late December takes center stage) or the single focus point it might have been before. Other holidays are recognized and anticipated (the spring and fall candy festivals rank highly with people under the age of majority).

Over time, as the calendars pile up on the closet floor, other mileposts loom in the distance. You become “old enough to…” do various things. Drive a car, get a job, get a “friend” (rather than a buddy). Eventually you can drink, vote, and get drafted (not so much now, but a VERY frightening area of growing up during the ’60’s and ’70’s).

But eventually, you hit a plateau, where adding another notch on the belt of life is pretty much just another day (however, one with cake and ice cream). You don’t generally get any substantial benefits from what you had the day before (some restaurants will discount your meal based on your age, but a 1% additional reduction won’t cover the taxes for the meal). And there become certain milestone numbers that actual have additional stress attached (more emotional than rational, but for adult males the first doctor’s appointment after the big 5-0 has “thrills” that can be unnerving to contemplate). Decade numbers (30, 40, 50, …) are all mental triggers you are indeed getting old(er). For some, that is unsettling at best.  Some simply choose to deny or ignore the numbers as they get larger.

I was at a friend’s forty-first (it is less stressful to see it written this way than to just put “41” out there) birthday party. There was around twenty people around and we sat and enjoyed stories and talk (and the mandatory cake and ice cream). Overall it went well, but there was a comment made that really brought us back to reality. Someone mentioned that we didn’t do the same things we had a couple of years ago (might have been referencing a bowling event following the C&IC segment). As the night wore on people excused themselves to depart for home, and eventually the celebrant also departed for home and bed. The end of the event sort of fizzled out and ended with more of a whimper than a bang.

In fairness, there are children tangentially involved that were not “present” during earlier celebrations (I still have one of the “It’s a Boy” cigars as proof) so dad can be exonerated for seeking an opportunity to catch a few additional moments of shut eye. And gravity has increased (continues to grow larger with each passing year) while the length of each day grows shorter over time (while there is about the same amount of light in each day as when I was a kid, they don’t put anywhere as much dark in the nights anymore… just look at the bags under my eyes). So a (more) sedate party should not come as a surprise anymore.

I’m just not looking forward to the pit stops during the upcoming wheelchair races in the (hopefully distant) future.

Phred

post 28 of n

A Recipe For Disappointment

I like pie.

I like food in general. I like to cook, I like to eat. (I HATE to clean, so eventually there is a balancing of forces in the universe. I haven’t exploded yet.) Among the 25 (estimated) bookshelves in my apartment, there are (at least) two dedicated to cookbooks (I have almost twenty books for my bread machine alone). In general, I will try anything once (kimchee, for example…only once, though) and have added to my addiction by subscribing to a few / several / many / most (?) websites about food. I get new teasers daily in my inbox. Fun, right?

Well, not so much. I know I am getting older, and understand with aging tastes change and become less pronounced over time, but I never expected it to be this bad this quickly. To my horror, I am finding that it doesn’t matter whether it is Italian or Oriental, Thai, Mexican, or Jamaican, they pretty much taste the same. Or if it is main dishes, deserts, confectionery delights or decadent cookies loaded with fat and sugar. The most mundane to the most exotic, containing animal, vegetable, or mineral ingredients, it simply doesn’t matter. I check out every new recipe on my computer,

When I lick the screen for a sample, they all taste like dust…

Phred

Post 24 of n

There’s No Place Like Roam

I finally made it home after an extended pair of trips.  A five-hundred-fifty mile journey to and from Indianapolis followed by a two hundred mile trek to see my granddaughter (and to provide taxi service to her parents while a car was in the shop). Basically this travel ate up the last half-month (save for a 45 minute gap in the middle to swap dirty clothes between the segments) and my body has been hallucinating about the joy of using my own furniture (I know my bed’s lumpy, but the lumps are in all the right places).

Finally the two hour drive home ends as I turn into the driveway at my apartment complex. My usual parking place is occupied (just as I had expected) so I parked in the closest overflow space. This necessitates about double the walking distance from my car to the door, but since I had taken my wheelchair on my trips (useful as a walker as well as a safe place to plop…and know I can get up again without calling for three spotters and a hoist) so the walk was manageable. I did notice a rather larger sheet of ice covering parts of the drive and walkways than usual, but since the air temperature was  10° F (-12° C) I presumed all was normal. HA!

Once I got in the door, there were two notices facing out to warn people about to depart into the world: that the drive and sidewalks might be slippery (a common notice that is hung at the first snowfall and remains till spring), and that because of the ongoing water problems they were flushing a well pump and to avoid walking across the ice sheets. THAT might have been nice to know about 10 minutes earlier as I began to navigate the antarctic ice cap that was our parking lot. But, no matter, my body reminded me that we were inside and only 30 feet from paradise and another room away from that glorious bed (rather than the hammock shaped torture device in Indiana or the sloping shelf of the kid’s broken futon frame which results in sleeping at the bottom of the letter “V”). Oh the blissful thought…

Put the key in the lock and find there are two notices on the shelf by my door. One is the monthly calendar for March events (also expected). The other points out that since one of the complexes well pumps failed (?) there was going to be the need to take at least two (2) water samples before we could be certified with safe water and that [the residents] needed to collect water before the testing began, and that the end of the “boil water” advisory would be posted in a couple of places. Oh, and they were going to have to flush the well and piping so there would be a great deal more ice outdoors than normal, so be careful. Great. I wonder if it took effect and when it would end. It’s just after nine in the evening but I didn’t see any lights on at my neighbor’s apartment. I let myself in and in the middle of the floor of the kitchen is a sealed gallon jug of spring water from the grocery store next door. Apparently someone thought I should have something to drink when I (eventually) got home. Nice to be remembered during challenging times.

I can hear water running. Still expected as I left all faucets running before I left to help keep the pipes from freezing. The water lines and heating pipes (we have hot water baseboard heating) run through the space above the apartments. Last winter a pipe in the next unit over broke about midnight. Before it was shut off, the hallway had a lake 3 inches deep and about 15 feet long starting just outside and to the left of my apartment door (my neighbor couldn’t get out without walking through the lake, and part of the flood was running down the wall of her kitchen). So the running water sound and corresponding rust stains where the iron-rich water splashed continuously the last three weeks was a “pleasant” reminder of home.

When I turned on the lights and looked closer, in addition to the rust a ring of grey silt had dried on the bottom sink surfaces. It looked like someone had entered my apartment and opened the faucets to flush the nasty water from the pipes. Or most of it, as they didn’t think (or care?) to rinse the sand/silt down the drain before resetting the flow to drip-mode. In any case, the sinks and bathtub look down right nasty (no long hot shower to unlax from the trip tonight, I’m afraid). When I flushed the toilet, I couldn’t see through the grey water that filled the bowl. I guess a couple (dozen?) more flushes might be needed before clean water appears again, but who knows?

Not I, said the cat… (quaint reference to a children’s story where the template ends with “then I will do it myself…and she did.”) I took a ride down to the office to see if more details could be found (and collect my mail). None found, met no one along the way there or back so the mystery must remain until morning.

Then there’s the problem with the computer (did not power up when  turned on, just made pathetic beeping sounds until completely disconnected  and reconnected the thing). And the internet would not work until router and modem recycled. And I discovered I failed to put away a can of refrigerator biscuits so they exploded from the tube. And then subsequently dried to a rock-hard mass needing a knife-chisel to dislodge and dispose of. And I had neglected to recharge the Steven-Hawkings-mobile (my electric cart’s name) after the south journey so my ride to the office was in danger of dead-battery syndrome and a lengthy push (it made it back, but I suspect it would have died had the trip been a third longer).

But I’m home, and I’m happy. And in about another 10 minutes, I’m going to reward my body with just what it’s been craving for the last couple of weeks…

I just need to take these ruby slippers off first.

Phred

post 20 of n

Eulogy For A Fiend

I have a love/loath relationship with technology. As an edge baby-boomer (born late in the category) I grew up in a time slightly before miniaturization. People walking by with the original cell phones (slightly smaller than a walkie-talkie and just about as nice looking) were viewed as totally off the rocker. Today to be a person without a cell phone at all is a chargeable offense. (Truth be known, I miss phones with cords. They were greatly more convenient to pinch between ear and shoulder…and, yes, I know you can get Bluetooth headsets to eliminate even this level of neck strain.) My education and training has allowed me to stay reasonably adept in new technology, but daily I find my level of usefulness is getting smaller as pertaining to new devices and tech. I can program my VCR (and even set the clock, lest the …12:00…12:00…12:00… blinking cause seizures) but don’t own a DVR at all, so programming TV to watch upon demand in digital format is outside of my wheelhouse.

I am currently away from home, having returned from my road trip earlier this week to Indiana and checked into my home (apartment) for about 45 minutes before dragging back into the car to spend time with my kids (son, DIL, and granddaughter), requiring another two hour drive towards Detroit. As a result, I am required to borrow and share technology I am somewhat unfamiliar with. The computer I am working on is a HP laptop running Windows 7. This is awkward for a couple of reasons: it’s a laptop, and it’s running Windows 7.

I am uncomfortable typing on most laptops (and this one is no exception) because the keyboard is (1) smaller than my Microsoft Natural keyboard at home, and (2) the keys are flat, planar, and have a small travel when pressed.I am a largish guy (I carry a lot of weight in this organization) so the smaller profile causes my hands to drift away from the “home” location. Typing by touch works only 30% of the time (added challenge is I type Dvorak layout, thus requiring a half hour to setup the computer configuration every time I start working on a foreign computer). In addition, the mouse-substitute pad is located exactly where my hands want to rest after 10-15 seconds, causing the cursor to move erratically to various locations on the screen. With a USB mouse and another 10 minute configuration change, i have been able to disable the blasted thing altogether. I hope it works when Samantha tries to use her profile…

More disturbing is that I am now required to ask to use the kid’s Kindle to check my e-mail and WP stats because my I-Pad has died. I was gifted with a first generation apple device when friends upgraded all the technology in their house. I lived in a state of abject isolation (no internet or cable TV in my apartment) so it was difficult (to say the least) to keep in touch with friends and family through e-mail. (Facebook is completely out of the question). My friend Ryan provided me with his old device so I would be able to use WIFI to check mail from the lobby (by connecting to the office’s link). It was quite a change from finding out events of interest and importance only a few days after the fact rather than weeks or months later. (Rumor control suggests it is possible to stay connected with modern cell phones, but I have a whole other rant about owning the WORST CELL PHONE EVER DESIGNED AND CREATED BY THE FOULEST DEMONS FROM THE LOWEST PITS OF HADES! I will post more about it some other time when my blood pressure drops to an acceptable level).

While traveling to the south earlier this week, it stopped working sometime in the very early hours of Thursday morning. This was not exactly unexpected, as for about the last year the device was temperature sensitive. When used or stored in ambient air temperatures below about 68F it would indicate a dead battery and would shut off. Showing love to the pad by cuddling or holding it close to my heart until it was warm (or using an equivalent, like a heating pad or furnace register) would bring my friend back from the icy wastelands of near-death. I found myself sleeping with the thing beside me in bed (singing me to sleep and providing ambient background noises throughout the night).

This time, however, things have become more serious. After almost an hour of attempting CPR (compress against chest) and defibrillator use (plugging into charger) there was still no signs of life, just the slim red bar on an empty battery appearing for a few seconds after pushing the on button, then fading to dark. Several times a day since, I have tried (again and again and again and …) to revive my fallen friend without any success.

A couple of people have suggested it is time to set it aside and move on with my life. While in my more lucid moments, I can acknowledge intellectually the wisdom of this action, I am not able to accept this as the end of our relationship. I had a couple of week period where it was in a similar coma around Thanksgiving last year, and I think maybe it will come back if I just show enough care and affection. I know it is just a matter of time (the device has no camera and is unable to understand O/S beyond 5.1.1 so it is incapable of learning new tricks). And I have enough invested in our relationship not to even broach the thought of moving to Android or another system.

I have not lost hope, regardless of the seemingly inevitable result. Just a couple of weeks more to see if it will come back. I know it will…

My heart just couldn’t take having to go back to my Palm Pilot III…

Phred

post 16 of n

Relatively Relative Relativity

“Time flies like an arrow. Fruit flies like a banana.”

For someone that plays with words, this saying is pure joy. The multiple meanings of words, the crazy parallelism, the twisted images. It is fun, but sadly not a true statement (or rather, pair of statements). My experience is fruit flies would rather have an avocado any day. Not that they are banana adverse, but there is something about an over ripe and under processed piece of raw guacamole that will generate MILLIONS of friends for a party that never ends. I was still using my vacuum cleaner to try and evacuate my kitchen of moving dust motes with wings 22 days after returning from an ill-advised trip. Gone 10 days, vinegar traps the next month.

As for time, an arrow doesn’t necessarily travel in a straight line (a parabola due to gravity and deflection from wind from side to side) or at a constant rate (friction verses a slight acceleration due to gravity) but it does not do justice to the variance experienced in the real world.

In the first third of my life, the concept of a time frame of 20 years was inconceivable. In fact, years seemed to be mostly an imaginary construct in a life of such short duration. Months and weeks were more manageable chunks to grasp in one’s imagination. Oh, to anticipate a birthday in the fall or the joy of Christmas during a day-dreaming session in school during a warm spring day was conceivable, but to actually suggest the ability to plan for a “future” more than a few calendar pages out seemed ludicrous at best.

The second third allowed for the growth of more abstract units of time. Employment created the need to “plan a 2 week vacation next year” with enough vision to actually submit a form to HR with proposed dates. Marriage and the start of a family made a “nine month” window slide from imaginary to imagery to immediate activity. Children expands ones (event) horizon to encompass whole blocks of time, the “terrible twos” through the teens (shudder!). Still, a two-decade block of time is a stretch to wrap one’s mind around.

Which brings us to the third half (as the tappet brothers used to say on “Car Talk”) of our show life. It seems absurd, but I am discovering that most of the interesting stories I am sharing include at some point the line “… that happened about… umm, twenty some years ago….” Now, I realize it is a time span going from over twice a lifetime to about a lifetime to about a third of a lifetime in this millennium, but (depending on what category you, the reader falls into) it is either impossible or depressing. And perhaps both in the same moment.

Also disorienting is the realization that time is anything but linear. I have been involved in radio for… um, well over twenty years or so now (starting in 1974, so I guess I need to repeat myself). While in the Navy, we would tune a short-wave radio to the WWV broadcast in Fort Collins, CO. This was a “clock” that ticked (and beeped) 58 times a minute, 60 minutes an hour, 24 x 7. It was partially a source of background noise, and a constant reminder of what time it was (which we needed to know as we processed messages from around the world). To hear “This is radio station WWV, Fort Collins Colorado, broadcasting on internationally allocated standard carrier frequencies of 2.5, 5, 10, 15, and 20 megahertz, providing time of day, standard time intervals and other related information…” twice an hour was to be lulled into thinking time passed with metronome like precision.

Wrong! Everybody “knows” that time passes faster or slower depending on what you are doing. A minute sitting in history class takes about 400 seconds. Sitting at a table sharing the evening with your best friends can have 19 minute hours evaporate into the ether. And, as the ultimate example, were it not for event-driven time dilation why else would the last two minutes of every basketball game take just under an hour on an observer’s clock (not in the arena, but on the microwave in the kitchen, for example, while watching on TV)?

I was told as a youth that the older I got, the faster time would seem to pass. It has proven to be true, but I think I can give a scientific explanation for why: nocturnal-derived changes in angular rotation of the Earth. You see, just as gravity is much stronger today than it was when I was younger (I estimate it has increased at least 70% in the last three decades alone), the amount of darkness in the night period is much shorter than it was last millennium. Daylight periods have not changed (at least if you disregard the cumulative effects of “Daylight Savings Time”) but they don’t put as much dark in the nights as they used to.

In essence, the phrase used to start this rant would be better stated as

“Time flies like fruit flies”

Phred

post 15 of n