And Summer Nears Its End

Today is the last day of meteorological summer. I woke up to the sound of thunder and rain. I walked outside into a tropical air mass, fogging my glasses. It still felt like summer. But that is about to change.

Thunder storms, rain, wind, clouds- signs of a cold front which is forecast to drop the temperatures into the 70s, actually normal for this time of year. 80s are still forecast for next week but we really do not need a weatherman in Minnesota to tell you that now we are on borrowed time. The calendar turns to September tomorrow and fall is on the way.

And now as I put the finishing touches to this post, severe thunderstorms have rumbled through the area, rain came down and the wind was blowing again. I'm not entirely ready to give up on summer yet.

A Noted Passing

A truly great songwriter died last week. George David Weiss died at age 89 of natural causes.

Never heard of him? That's because he was the songwriter and not the singer. Starting in 1946 he wrote some of the soundtrack of the 20th Century including The Lion Sleeps Tonight, It's a Wonderful World, and probably his best known- made popular by some dude named Presley:

Link to NPR Music News

Take Time to Relax

Or as Andrew Sullivan at the Daily Dish calls them- a Mental Health Break.


Journey through Canyons from Metron on Vimeo.

Pictures

The Minneapolis Duathlon- 

The World's Largest

and I was there

Bikes, bikes, bikes... waiting.

 My start time in Wave 14.

It is tough to get "still" pictures when you are running. Getting ready to cross the Stone Arch Bridge the first time.

Heading back to the city after the biking turnaround.

The final transition- the run-out after biking. A mile and a half to go.

Last time across the 3rd St. Bridge

Final trip across the Stone Arch Bridge

A relieved and happy smile.

Duathlon Report - Stats

Okay. Here are the stats for Fun Course Duathlon today:

• Average time for the Fun Course-- 1:27:52
• Which represents a range of-- :55 to 2:22:66
• 340 people completed-- 104 men and 236 women

• My Total Time-- 1:44:26.
• My Overall rank-- 299/340
• My rank in gender: 102/104 (Both men behind me were younger! but slowest in my age group of men.)
• Only 5 men and 2 women 60 and over were in the Fun Course
• In Full Duathlon there were 14 men and 6 women in the 60+ age
• So- out of 1722 finishers in one of the Duathlon courses 27 (1.6%) were 60+  

And I was one of them!!!

Breakdowns of my segments:

• Run 1= 20:20 (13:34 mile or a 4.42 MPH pace)
• Transition 1= 3:31
• Bike = 54:02 (4:55 mile or 12.22 mph pace)
• Transition 2= 4:26
• Run 2= 22:08 (14:46 mile or 4.07 mph pace)

Run 1 was slightly ahead of my normal training pace over the past 2 weeks and Run 2 was slightly behind. Biking was awesome considering there were two significant hills (one in each direction!) with the second being at about 9.5 - 10.2 mile marks. But then I sprinted to the end. I managed several 16+ mph steady pedals on the second half of the course.

Pictures and thoughts to come.

I Finished...

My Duathlon was a great time.

I finished first in the division of 62-year old dudes doing the Du for the first time on a Trek 7000 bike.

Pictures and more thoughts to follow.

To get My Day Started

I figured this was a good morning (or good-morning) post on the day of my first Duathlon.

It comes from Carlton Reid's Photostream on Flickr.

Also check out the Bicycle and Creativity pool on Flickr.

These are for real this morning in downtown Minneapolis.....

Off to the Race

Well, tomorrow's the big day. I run my first Duathlon in Minneapolis. I'm as ready as I think I can be. As we joked around at lunch on Thursday one of my colleagues asked if I'd been training, since I'd been joking with another colleague about being out of shape etc. And the answer is "Yes, I have been training." I can't say it's been a lot of intense training, but for at least the past six weeks I have been doing some running and continuing my biking. Today I head to Minneapolis and pick up my race packet, including my number, review the whole process of running then biking and running again. I gather there's a whole art of going through the transitions.

But I'm not in it to win or set any records. I'm in it for the fun of it and the challenge of doing something new. For those of you who know me you are aware that I've liked to challenge myself from time to time with new things. So here less than a month after I turned 62, another one of my challenges.

I promise to update you tomorrow --

If I can still walk.

August 28, 1963

Preparing for a Tony Award?

Last Saturday my wife and I had the pleasure, no make that challenge, of seeing the Broadway-bound musical, Scottsboro Boys at the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. I now understand the word "agape." No not the Greek word for love but the word for standing with her mouth open unable to close it. The musical is beyond description. I wanted to start a standing ovation half -way through when they did the showstopper dance number -- dancing around an electric chair!

The story of the Scottsboro Boys is the story of a miscarriage of justice in the depression-era South. Nine African-American young men are accused of rape, tried, and sentenced to death. The musical tells their story in song and dance (yes, song and dance) in the form of a "reverse" minstrel show. Here it's black performers being white imitators, though, fortunately not in white face. The white sheriff and his deputy; the white women supposedly raped; the white northern Jewish lawyer -- all performed by the black singers and dancers.

Everyone is open for challenge, being blasted out of the water, skewered, exposed. The northern liberals and the southern conservatives are shown in all their hypocrisy. The play's intensity grows and grows until, at the end, you are left gasping for air, the air knocked out of you by the truth, a truth you thought you knew. Far more powerful than any sermon or spoken tirade you are first lulled into submission by the music and contrasts. Then they hit you.

How can you do a musical about 1930s injustice and racism in the South? The same way you do one on pre-Hitler Nazism in Germany; or showgirls , murder, and prison in the Midwest; or a homosexual prisoner in a Latin American jail. John Kander and Fred Ebb, in their last collaboration before Ebb died, have done it just as they did in Cabaret, Chicago, Kiss of the Spider Woman. After closing here in September the musical moves to Broadway in October. I hope New York is ready - it is an amazing musical.

For me what hit home the most was how demeaning the old minstrel shows were. You don't realize it until you see one of your own ethnic groups done in the same manner -- exactly the same. In this case what struck me was a caricature of the New York Jewish lawyer. They utilized all the stereotypes of "Jews" just as offensively as the old minstrel shows demean African-Americans.

Back when doing the training for the Race Exhibit that has been here in Rochester since May, we were challenged to look at the use of native portrayals in school mascots -- you know Indians, Redskins, etc. One of the questions that we were asked in the discussion at that time was, "How do you think people would respond if instead of Indians they used caricatures of Jews or Germans or any other white European ethnic group?" The answer in our discussion was clearly that the response would be anything but accepting.

But there it was on stage at the Guthrie Theater showing us whites how hideous and violent it was. Talk about a challenge. At the end the audience gave an immediate, spontaneous, long standing ovation. It was well-earned and well-deserved. I will be very surprised if this is not nominated for a Tony Award next year.

Watch for it!

Who Youse Lookin' At?

From Yahoo! News last evening, an article about a former Philadelphian who is selling a T-Shirt that says it all:

I'm not angry. I'm from Philly.

He decided to do this after being taken as rude and angry because of his bluntness.

If you've never been to Philly, you wouldn't understand.

Who Will Win If We Lose?

I haven't posted yet on the whole Ground Zero mosque debate.I have watched and listened with growing sadness, and a great sense of fear that we are losing something very important in this day and age.

I then came across a new book the other day at the library, Preaching With Sacred Fire which is an anthology of African-American sermons. I opened to one of the more recent sermons from 2001, not long after 9/11. I found the following, and it chilled me as I thought of what's going on at Ground Zero.

The devil likes unbelief, and he likes our thought life to be in agreement with fear. That's all he wants you to do is have fear, fear, fear. You walk around in fear. But you do understand that God has not given us the spirit of fear. He has given us power. He has given us love. He has given us a sound mind. But if the devil can make you fearful -- put fear throughout your mind, he's got you!

I me tell you something, people of God, bin Laden really doesn't have to do another thing. Because you know what has happened in America? Fear has taken over our minds, and because fear has taken over our minds -- that's why the economy is all messed up. Stock market is down. I mean, fear is crazy. You go to the airport, and they don't care who they stop. 80-year-old woman -- and what is she going to have on her? Can hardly move; can hardly walk. Fear! That is what the devil does. Bin Laden can just stand back and laugh and say, I don't have to do anything, I've got them now.
--"The Enemy Inside Your Mind, "(2001) Rev. Paul S. Morton, Sr. in Preaching With Sacred Fire, p.771

Fear! That is the underlying issue and it is one that is being used to great and terrifying ends. We are now afraid of anyone that might be, or even looks, Muslim. Yesterday a cab driver was stabbed after being asked if he was a Muslim. When he responded that he was the passenger attacked him. It is being called an anti-Muslim hate crime.

Fear! That's what it's all about. Is Obama a Muslim? Be afraid. Are anchor babies and illegal immigrants going to harm our standard of living? Be afraid. Is gay marriage going to ruin the institution of marriage? Be afraid. And when we act out of fear, unfortunately, we often act irrationally. Logic, common sense, thinking -- they go out the window.

I read again Pastor Morton's words if we have lost their fear takes over. Bin Laden need never again terrorize us for we are doing that to ourselves when we live in fear.

Perhaps it is also unbelief that is working at us. What we need is to believe again. We need to believe in ourselves. We need to believe in the rightness of our beliefs and values. We need to believe again that freedom of religion just as freedom of speech, freedom of the press, or even the right to keep and bear arms, are what set us apart and give us the ultimate and most powerful strength.

I pray that our American values and trust in the strength of our diversity will keep us free.

But If We Are to Win....

A Brief Break

In the hot and humid weather, that is. I actually feel chilly today. Low humidity, a NW wind gusting to 17-20 mph. I know some are saying they enjoy it- but to me it's a sign of things to come. Too cool.

So here is a summer picture to keep us remembering that it is still August.

When You Think You've Heard 'Em All

Out there in eastern Pennsylvania a 59-year old woman was on probation and told she couldn't drink alcohol. She failed a recent drug screen, testing positive for alcohol and was sent to jail for probation violation. But she wasn't drinking, she claimed. She was eating gin-soaked raisins to treat her arthritis since conventional medications didn't work.

She says she heard of this home remedy for arthritis on the radio from Paul Harvey. (Harvey died in February.)

It is amazing what people will do, believe, and say. I am not disputing the gin-soaked raisins (although it has that certain ring of denial about it.) But we humans have a really remarkable organ in the brain's ability to come up with ideas- good or bad- and then believe them.


I suppose that's The Rest of the Story.

--Link to Morning Call story.

Hummingbirds in Slo-Mo

Remarkable cinematography in slow motion.



LINK to full documentary on PBS

Three For Today

Unknown:

• "People are more violently opposed to fur than leather because it's safer to harass rich women than motorcycle gangs."

David Russell:

• "The hardest thing to learn in life is which bridge to cross and which to burn."

Kurt Herbert Alder:

• "Tradition is what you resort to when you don't have the time or the money to do it right."

Finally....

A new use for a trombone:

Jonathan Crawford and his propane-enhanced trombone.

HT to The Awesomer
Link

One Week To Go

Duathlon is an athletic event that consists of a running leg, followed by a cycling leg and then another running leg in a format bearing some resemblance to triathlons.

The largest duathlon in the United States is the Minneapolis Duathlon in Minnesota put on by the Team Ortho Foundation. In 2009, its first year, it had more than 1,000 participants. 68% of the participants were new to the sport of duathlon.
--Wikipedia

And the date for the 2010 Minneapolis Duathlon is Sunday, August 29. That is next Sunday morning. And, at age 62, I will be doing my very first ever duathlon. I will be doing the "Fun Course" (but it's all supposed to be fun, isn't it?) That means that it will be shorter and there will be no awards given. Just the satisfaction of having done it.

I have only been specifically training for this for about 8 weeks when I added "running" to be weekly workouts. I am still doing running and walking (4 min. running/1minute walking about 5 - 6 times). That is still well beyond the 1.5 miles of the course next week. And the biking will be only 12 miles, well within my 20-25 mile "easier" capacity.

Overall, I am excited. I ran one race once before in my life- a 5K, I think- in York, PA, about 30 years ago. Now, it is a whole new world for me. The result- mentally and physically- will help me decide whether I will do another one a couple weeks later in Pine Island. One of my co-workers has challenged me to do it with her. That one is 3.5 mile runs and 21 miles biking. THAT would be a stretch but I am told there is no shame in walking- even across the finish line.

I will keep you posted.

Only In Wisconsin ?

Loved this headline on Yahoo! News on Friday:

Wis. GOP candidate wins beer stein contest

It seems that one of the candidates for governor was in a beer stein holding contest. It consists of holding a beer stein - full of beer, of course - at arms length. He beat three others to win- and advance to the national championship in New York. Winning time: just over four minutes.

(Go ahead. Try it. This guy is a real champion.)

He is a former congressman who hopes to be Wisconsin's next governor. The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports that the national competition is in September, 11 days after the primary.

WISN, channel 12, has coverage..

The Power of Water

Last Sunday I made it back over to Whitewater State Park for a picture walk. It had been two months since I had been there, biking and other things getting in the way. This was just two days after a major rain storm, tornado warnings, and flood warnings. The Whitewater River brought devastation to the park three years ago and this was a similar situation.

So I headed to my standard starting spot, the concrete "steps" across the river behind the office.

 Sure enough the water was still high, muddy, and running fast. It's hard to see in the pan above, but the water was running over the "steps." A closer look (below) shows that the one about 2/3 across the river has been moved about three feet. You can't see it, but there's another one closer to the camera, as well.

 One of the rangers stopped by and commented that moving those blocks back into place will take a lot of work. But the river did it easily. As he also said, "When people come in and tell me that there are trees floating down the river, I stop and pay attention. And that was the river.

From there I went over to the other path along a small creek. Sure enough the power of water was visible again. The water wasn't quite as muddy since it is smaller and floods and recedes more quickly. But the results were real. Here, too, the downed (and drowned) trees are in the way, moved by that tiny little stream.

Picking up floating greenery and depositing it on overhanging limbs is not an unusual occurrence.

Later I overheard the Ranger asking a departing camper if they had a "memorable" weekend. Considering that they evacuated at least part of the campground, I found his half-grin ironic. He for one knows the power of that little river and its tiny tributaries. This park was closed for quite a while in 2007 and early 2008 due to this placid river. But with high bluffs on both sides funneling the water the only place it can go, it becomes quite a torrent.

[Speechless]

Wired.com has a post on This Summer's Sexiest Images From Saturn. There are 12 magnificent b & w photos taken by the Cassini spacecraft the past few months. Wired.com is right on when it calls these "mind-blowing. These two are my favorites, but they are but 1/6th of the total.

There's Money Somewhere

It was on the news the other day. The Vikings' Starting Quarterback is back in town. How did he get here? In a private jet. And all helicopters broke loose and followed his every move.

Hearing that on the news my wife looked up and said:

With all that, there must be money around somewhere.

To which I cynically (but honestly) replied:

The rich are never in a recession.

I'm as guilty as the next sports fan by continuing to support and make some people extremely rich and others obscenely rich. But that is part of why I liked Bill Gates and Warren Buffet urging their fellow "Wealthiest People" to give away more and more of their money. Even at that I will readily admit the obscenity of such wealth. Will I stop going to Twins games or watching football on TV? No. Is this hypocritical? Perhaps and probably. Can I do anything about it? Not a chance.

So I guess I will continue to be a hypocrite. Which places me right smack dab into the center of many of us.

Little League World Series Time

Every August since 1947 pre-teen baseball players have headed to Williamsport, PA, for the Little League World Series. That was the year before I was born not too far away from that mini-sports mecca. I first became aware of LLB in 1957 when a group of spunky players from Monterrey, Mexico, became the first international team to win the championship. Almost all the radio stations in Williamsport broadcast all the games and I would sit for hours listening to the games. I couldn't play baseball to save my life, but I loved baseball.

Inside LLB Museum, S. Williamsport, PA

I remember when they moved to the "new" stadium over in South Williamsport. I began to go to the games, taking the local inter-city bus and walking across the West Branch out to the field. I remember when ABC's Wide World of Sports would video tape the game and air it at their regular 5:30 time. I later worked for the ABC radio station just over the backstop of the field. (It is no longer there.) The World Series has been a part of my sports DNA for 50+ years.


Well, it's that time again. Now ESPN is there for all the games. Rules have changed; the tournament has expanded. But it's still the Little League World Series. It begins today. And, at 3:00 ET a team from Plymouth, MN, will take the field in Pool B against a team from Pearland, TX. That's neat. Good luck, team. Give Minnesota a win!

Little League World Series 2010

A Special Day

Happy
Birthday!

.... and many more!

We Are Not As Logical As We Think We Are

I have talked about this in various posts before, but it is one of those topics that I for one need to be reminded of on a regular basis. We do not think only logically. In fact, behavioral and cognitive scientists among others have discovered a whole slew of biases that regularly stump and stymie us. They are usually placed into four areas:

• Social biases,
• memory biases,
• decision-making biases, and
• possibility/belief biases.

Scribd. has posted a slide show that has information on these biases as taken from Wikipedia. According to Wikipedia:

A cognitive bias is the human tendency to make systematic errors in certain circumstances based on cognitive factors rather than evidence. Such biases can result from information-processing shortcuts called heuristics. They include errors in statistical judgment, social attribution, and memory. Cognitive biases are a common outcome of human thought, and often drastically skew the reliability of anecdotal and legal evidence.

I have had two interesting examples of this recently. One was a personal experience. I was having a conversation with several people about some of the Academy Award-winning movies and we got around to One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. I commented that I really liked the film and it coincided with my clinical experience at a state mental hospital in Pennsylvania in 1974. The problem is, the movie wasn't released until 15 months after I had finished my clinical training. What I think has happened is that I read the book at around the time I was doing my work at the state hospital and my mind put the book, the movie, and the experience together.

The other experience was in another conversation when an acquaintance was remembering a very specific event in his life. He says it happened when he was 13 and the KC Chiefs had just won the Super Bowl. There were a number of problems with his memory:

• The Chiefs were in the first Super Bowl in January, 1967. They lost (to the Packers).
• They were next in the Super Bowl in January, 1970. They won (against the Vikings.)
• My acquaintance was 13 in 1965.

He gave me a stunned look and just sat there.

These can be found in various forms among the 104 cognitive biases that regularly lead us astray. Does that mean we shouldn't trust our memory? Well, partly. But it does mean that we should be careful when we think we are so right that we can't in any way, shape, or form, be wrong. Chances are, I might very well be wrong and basing my life-or-death decisions on incorrect information.

Cognitive Biases - A Visual Study Guide

In Memoriam: Bobby Thomson

Bobby Thomson died yesterday. 

He was 86 years old.

In baseball, the "Shot Heard 'Round the World" is the term given to the game-ending home run hit by New York Giants outfielder Bobby Thomson off Brooklyn Dodgers pitcher Ralph Branca at the Polo Grounds to win the National League pennant at 3:58 p.m. EST on October 3, 1951. As a result of the "shot" (baseball slang for "home run" or any hard-hit ball), the Giants won the game 5–4, defeating the Dodgers in their pennant playoff series, two games to one. It is one of the most famous moments in Major League Baseball history.

The phrase shot heard 'round the world is from a classic poem by Ralph Waldo Emerson, originally used to refer to the first clash of the American Revolutionary War and since used to apply to other dramatic moments, military and otherwise. In the case of Thomson's home run, it was particularly apt as U.S. servicemen fighting in the Korean War listened to the radio broadcast of the game.

Thomson's homer, and the Giants' victory after overcoming a double-digit lead in the standings by the Dodgers in the weeks preceding the playoff, are also sometimes known as the Miracle of Coogan's Bluff.
--Wikipedia

Continuing My Video Kick

The Awesomer posted this the other day. The original photographer called it his "Perseid Meteor Shower Failure" because airplanes kept getting in the mix. Everyone who has seen it disagrees on the failure part. Myself included. There is always something new and different to see in the every day.


Perseid Meteor Shower Failure from ph dee on Vimeo.

A Classic Best-Seller

Saw this last evening on the USA Today Best Seller list from last week:

23. "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee (Grand Central Publishing)

Sure, it's because of it's 60th anniversary this year, but so what. When a book makes the OVERALL best seller list after 60 years, it is great news.

People still read!

My First Time-Lapse

I know it's not a big deal or a masterpiece of any kind. I simply set my new video camera and pointed it out the window when I knew some storms were going to move in. It's only 20 seconds and covers around an hour and a half, but it is mine. (And it is only natural that it is a weather video.)

Meanwhile over at Boing Boing on Saturday they posted a time-lapse and links for HOW TO Make time lapse. Just one more toy for me to play with. Here's the BBC video: Speeding Up Life from that post.

My Kind of Old Guy

According to the Associated Press a 78-year-old Pennsylvania man rode a roller coaster 90 times in one day. He is even a member of the roller coaster enthusiasts group. He now claims a lifetime total of 4000 rides.

This is my kind of old guy. He is my hero. It's been a while since I have ridden a roller coaster. Maybe one of these summers.

Words Made Visible

Public Radio and WNYC's innovative Radiolab Show on Words has a beauty video to accompany the podcast. Here is what it says on the website:

Words have the power to shape the way we think and feel. In this stunning video, filmmakers Will Hoffman and Daniel Mercadante bandy visual wordplay into a moving exploration of language set to an original score by Keith Kenniff.

Five Years of Daily Discipline

Today I end five years of daily posts. I have not missed a day since August 14, 2005. I just think that's kind of neat.

That's all.

Up to the Field

On our stay-cation we took a tour of Target Field with the team out of town. Here's the view as you come up to the field from the visitor's clubhouse. 

Quite a view, huh?

I'm Glad I'm Not Superstitious

They tell me it's unlucky.

Ah, Summer

We have had a great summer around these parts, including a heat wave that is about to break this weekend. So, since time is short, here are some quotes for these dog days of August:

Ah, summer, what power you have to make us suffer and like it.
- Russel Baker

If you saw a heat wave, would you wave back?
- Steven Wright

Someone's sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree a long time ago.
- Warren Buffett

Let me enjoy
this late-summer day of my heart
while the leaves are still green
and I won't look so close
as to see that first tint
of pale yellow slowly creep in.
I will cease endless running
and then look to the sky
ask the sun to embrace me
and then hope she won't tell
of tomorrows less long than today.
Let me spend just this time
in the slow-cooling glow
of warm afternoon light
and I'd think
I will still have the strength
for just one more
last fling of my heart.
- John Bohrn, Late August

An Increase in Exercise Will Become Epidemic

According to the AP yesterday, the Houston Texans asked the NFL to reduce or rescind the suspension given to linebacker Brian Cushing claiming something called overtrained athlete syndrome.

Cushing said the syndrome can trigger hormonal spikes after breaks in training. This was his explanation for why he tested positive for a fertility drug last September. He says he never took the drug.

I can see the ads for your local gym/health center now.

Get fit and be ready for the romance afterward. But see a doctor if it lasts longer than four hours.

Who You Looking At?

A picture from our recent stay-cation. This one from along the Mississippi as this Bald Eagle just sat there watching us watching him.

Proud To Be A Brass Player

Spent Saturday at the Vintage Band Festival in Northfield, MN. Amazing music on meriod and contemporary instruments.

Kentucky Baroque Trumpets; the First Brigade Band from Watertown, WI,; the Lake Wobegon Brass; the Chicago Brass Band; the New Ulm Original German Band; Tschecháranka from Austria; Dodworth Saxhorn Band and Newberry’s Victorian Cornet Band (in church Sunday Morning.)

Awesome.  These are dedicated musicians, many volunteers, and fun. The music ranged from early trumpet calls to contemporary brass band pieces. There was dancing in the (blocked off) street, the sound of cicadas and the nearby water falling over the Cannon River dam; hot dogs, popcorn, and a good, old, down-home feel.

In talking to one of the participant musicians he said he does what he does because he wants to help people feel good and music is his way of doing that. Another trumpet player whose smile was as big as mine the whole day, was overwhelmed by the music and the way it can touch us. One of the musicians as part of the group's presentation talked about the time he heard music and gave him "chill-bumps" on top of "chill-bumps." He then played it for us.

I am glad to be a musician and this weekend was proud to be part of the community of brass musicians!

Here's a You Tube of Tschecháranka.

The Truth Can Set Us Free

Sometimes the truth is spoken by people like C. S. Lewis. As I have discovered this amazing truth about prayer, I find I am more and more free in my life and in my relationship to God.

I pray because I can't help myself.
I pray because I'm helpless.
I pray because the need flows out of me all the time---waking and sleeping.

It doesn't change God---it changes me.
---C.S. Lewis

More from C. S. Lewis at Explore Faith.

Slo-Mo Fun

I have always liked slow motion video that allows us to see and do things, well, in a different time frame. Here's one that takes you across America in 1:54.



And in case you want top see how they did it, here's the behind the scenes video (which is twice as long as the slo-mo.)

Sixty-Five Years Later

In Memory

August 6, 1945

Hiroshima, Japan

Paper cranes, folded as prayers for peace. Peace Memorial Park, Hiroshima, Japan.

The crane tradition comes from the true story of Sadako Sasaki a young girl who died from radiation from the bomb. She believed that if she folded 1,000 paper cranes she would be cured. To this day, people (mostly children) from around the world fold cranes and send them to Hiroshima where they are placed near the statue.

Wikimedia

Think

If you say you want your Higher Power to guide your footsteps-

Make sure you are willing to move your feet.

Happy Birthday, Pops

August 4, 1901- Louis "Satchmo" Armstrong

A truly remarkable and unique musician, Pops did more than any dozen musicians of his - or probably any - era of popular music. The biography by Terry Teachout, Pops, gives an excellent introduction to the important musical pieces and recordings that made history as well as putting them into the proper place in his life.

Here is a "video" of arguably his most innovative and original, West End Blues. What makes this interesting is the transcription of Armstrong's solos.

Oh, and a "few" years after Pops- my birthday, too.

And that other "Barry" in the White House a few years after that.

Happy Birthday to us all.

A Wonderful Stay-cation

We had one of the best vacations this past week or so. We stayed home. I guess they call that a "stay-cation" in today's language. Since I usually report on my vacations, I thought I would start by simply reflecting on being at home doing nothing.

We've done this before, but this time the weather and the stars and all the karma of the universe (at least in SE Minnesota) fell together to make it special.

We saw two movies in daytime matinees. One Inception, I already mentioned. The other was the relationship flick, The Kids Are All Right. That review will be coming up.

We did three "road trips." First we went to Minneapolis for a tour of Target Field. I have been to some games, but I really wanted my wife to see it. We were both royally impressed and even got to sit in the dugouts. We ended the day with supper at a really good Mexican restaurant in Eagan, El Parian, with our daughter and her significant other.

Trip #2 was to the Mississippi River for an Eco Cruise out of La Crosse and a visit to the replicas of Columbus's ships the Nina and the Pinta at Winona. Pictures and commentary on each of those will be up later. An inspiring day. This was our longest road trip- about 160 miles total.

And Trip #3 was to the Root River area around Lanesboro and Whalen, MN. At Lanesboro we went to see a play at the Commonweal Theatre, Steve Martin's Picasso at the Lapin Agile. A funny play that may also get its own post in the days ahead. We then HAD, absolutely HAD to go to the Aroma Pie Shop in nearby Whalen.

Earlier in the vacation we also had gone to the Rochester Repertory Theater for their Evening to Hang Your Hat On, a series of 8 ten-minute plays.

In between I took a couple of naps, started my running training for the Duathlon at the end of the month and read and rode my bike. In short, it is what a vacation is supposed to be. I didn't even check my work email until I got to work this morning. I am proud of myself for that one.

Vacations, or holidays as some places call them, are true times of renewal and refreshment. They are essential to ongoing mental health I am convinced. Sometimes we do deeply engaging things in travel and sometimes we just kick back and discover what is already right at hand in our own backyard.

Which, naturally, reminds me of a story, this one being an old Hasidic parable found in many variations. This one is from Martin Buber's Tales of the Hasidim. (link.)

Rabbi Bunam used to tell young men who came to him for the first time the story of Rabbi Eisik, son of Rabbi Yekel in Cracow. After many years of great poverty which had never shaken his faith in God, he dreamed someone bade him look for a treasure in Prague, under the bridge which leads to the king's palace. When the dream recurred a third time, Rabbi Eisik prepared for the journey and set out for Prague. But the bridge was guarded day and night and he did not dare to start digging. Nevertheless he went to the bridge every morning and kept walking around it until evening.

Finally the captain of the guards, who had been watching him, asked in a kindly way whether he was looking for something or waiting for somebody. Rabbi Eisik told him of the dream which had brought him here from a faraway country. The captain laughed: "And so to please the dream, you poor fellow wore out your shoes to come here! As for having faith in dreams, if I had had it, I should have had to get going when a dream once told me to go to Cracow and dig for treasure under the stove in the room of a Jew—Eisik, son of Yekel, that was the name! Eisik, son of Yekel! I can just imagine what it would be like, how I should have to try every house over there, where one half of the Jews are named Eisik,and the other Yekel!" And he laughed again. Rabbi Eisik bowed, traveled home, dug up the treasure from under the stove, and built the House of Prayer which is called "Reb Eisik's Shul."

So now I am home where the treasure is. It was fun not having to leave to discover it.

I'll Believe It When the Season is Done

According to the AP this morning, the Vikings' Starting Quarterback will NOT be back this season. Even an official announcement won't convince me. If my memory serves me correctly that has been said at least several times before. And, as some have theorized, the Vikings bye week is week 4. Still plenty of time to come in and be the savior of the team.

I just wish we could stick to playing football instead of guessing games. But then again, it would reduce the number of posts I have.

And, for old times' sake, and just in case the rumor isn't true:

Brett Who?

Bend Your Mind Around This

A few months ago ListVerse had a Top 11 of brain-twisting paradoxes. Among them was this fun one at #4:

Suppose there is a town with just one male barber; and that every man in the town keeps himself clean-shaven: some by shaving themselves, some by attending the barber. It seems reasonable to imagine that the barber obeys the following rule: He shaves all and only those men in town who do not shave themselves.

Under this scenario, we can ask the following question: Does the barber shave himself?
Asking this, however, we discover
that the situation presented is in fact impossible:

- If the barber does not shave himself, he must abide by the rule and shave himself.
- If he does shave himself, according to the rule he will not shave himself

Of course the #1 brain-twister is the age-old one of an irresistible force meeting immovable object. Like all mind-benders of this sort it is unanswerable since it would take an infinite amount of energy to be irresistible or immovable.

But perhaps more importantly it was reported a few weeks ago that British scientists have "cracked" the greatest mystery of the chicken or egg. And the answer (with drum roll, please) is:

The Chicken

It has something to do with certain chemicals or proteins that control egg production which needs a chicken to exist. Here's a link to an article on MSNBC.

In case you are interested, it is reported in a scholarly paper with the exciting and enticing title of Structural Control Of Crystal Nuclei By An Eggshell Protein.

Honoring Creation

Gracious God, help me simply stop for a moment to pay attention to the beauty of creation all around me. I am so grateful for water so still it can reflect the color of the world; for trees in full leafy green; for air so warm it relaxes my body and soul; for cool breezes that caress and awaken; for clouds that shift and puff; for azure skies that stretch beyond sight. Let me remember to simply stop for a moment and be filled with the gifts you have so abundantly given. Amen.
-ExploreFaith.com