s n a p p e r h e a d

REPLAY by Ken Grimwood - Book Review (☆☆☆☆☆)

This speculative fiction novel combines the perfect blend of what-if from Groundhog ~~Day~~ quarter century, with the clean pacing and suspense of The Time Traveler's Wife (book not film). Soft science fiction fans will not be disappointed because Ken Grimwood deftly dangles the bet-you-know-what'll-happen-next bait followed by several successful surprises.

I enjoyed the story enough to give it my highest rating because I recall almost all of the key American events which happened between 1963 and 1988. However, the downfall of a story which leans as heavily on a specific country's historical events as REPLAY does, is that it gradually loses its audience. Consequently, I don't recommend it to anyone born after 1970 (unless they are history/SF buffs or love period-pieces)...readers born between 1970 and 1980 will rate it four-stars, between 1980-1990, three stars, et cetera.

I suspect this novel will become a shitty movie someday soon (I'm a bit surprised it hasn't already). Just like many books of this type, the success of the plot is based on the empathy we slowly gain watching the world go by through the main character(s) eyes. Films rarely succeed in relating "over a long period of time" to their audiences. The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (the film, not Fitzgerald's short story) attempted to accomplish this feat...and bored most of its audience while doing so. There are exceptions. Robert Zemeckis's Forrest Gump (a bad book turned into a great screenplay) is the first example I can think of. If someone had the patience and skill to Gumpize REPLAY and could find the perfect 28 year-old everyman-character actor who is not a comedian (who must capture the two-and-a-half decades between college freshman and middle age; make us love him, feel sorry for him, hate him, and eventually love him again)...I picture ....ahhh.... nobody comes to mind. Which is why this hypothetical film will be made out of pure suckage.

Dear fuzzy-headed faces from prestigious places,

          Please stop dumbing-down your [specific area of scientific expertise] to coloring book level. I'm really sorry [name of college or university] doesn't pay enough for you to disregard all those enticing offers from [television channel] but every time you recite from a script written to be understood by [target audience] you inflict excruciating pain in my brain.
   I know. Brains don't actually have pain receptors. But, when watching [video of gravity tests in a testosterone-laden common-sense-free environment] I experience (real-to-me) empathetic groin pain and I feel a similar pain inside my skull when I watch you transmogrify [complex theorem or formula] to the level of SeeDickAndJaneRun.

Because specifics are better than vague analogies:

• Tweedle Dee, aka Brian Richmond, The George Washington University (NOVA, Becoming Human minutes 2:28 thru 3:00) - his explanation of a few theories why quadrupedal protohumans became bipedal: "...they stood up to be able to see over tall grass...they stood to be able to pick fruits off of the low branches of trees...(or)...to cool more efficiently so that we don't have as much sun beating on so much of our body."
          • Tweedle Dum, aka Daniel Leiberman, Harvard University (NOVA, Becoming Human minutes 3:00 thru 4:40) - his favorite opinion why quadrupedal protohumans became bipedal: "...the most compelling hypothesis is that it saved us energy."

These two idiots bruised my frontal lobes. Their few seconds of Discovery Channel fame only proved one thing: neither of them actually understands natural selection.

In a muddled attempt at simplicity, this NOVA episode completely fails to explain natural selection and offers information as true, which is the exact opposite of the truth. The show paints a picture that six million years ago, in the middle of protoAfrica (with the environment in flux and jungles becoming savannahs)...for reasons we can only guess at...a protochimpanzee stood on its hind legs and, subsequently, passed that ability to constantly walk upright to its progeny.

The fiction—like that of so many television shows based on psudo- and/or fuzzy-science—is relating that the reason/desire to walk upright preceded our distant ancestor's ability to do so. But when somebody from [prestigious place of higher learning] says, "they stood up in order to..." how can we interpret it otherwise?

What actually happened? How did a few of the little ancient monkeys who walked on four legs many millions of years ago eventually walk on only their two hind legs? The same way every gradual evolutionary change occurred in every living entity since the beginning of life. It happened by mistake. Zillions upon Trillions of miniscule beneficial mistakes. The same number (or more) of non-beneficial mistakes also (must've-probably) occurred, but any of those mistakes (those which don't improve their possessor's chance of procreation) are useless in evolutionary terms and lead to extinction.

One quadrupedal protohuman gave birth to a malformed baby with a slightly misshaped pelvis (I'll call her Miss Takè). Her pelvis was a bit too flat, too horizontal...and all the quadrupedal kids at school teased little Takè because she wasn't very good at reindeer games; but she was able to survive long enough to procreate and pass along that genetic error because she was [reason for not dying...including being lucky]. She had a fifteenth cousin twice removed with a slightly bent thumb which made swinging from branches a little harder than normal, but she always won at thumb-war; and her imperceptibly encephalitic and slightly taller great-great-great grandson (who could never peek over a log without his forehead being seen when playing hide-n-seek) became a great hunter because of his above-average eyesight...and his eighteenth son from his fifteenth mate (who happened to be distantly related to thumb-war cousin) was taller-still but he happened to have less body hair, hated the winter, and walked a long distance in order to live in a warmer place...ad infinitum...modern man.

          South Park's Mrs Garrison's grasp of the theory of evolution is more accurate. The fact that Trey Parker and Matt Stone are more capable than NOVA at explaining natural selection makes me giggle-cringe (but inflicts no pain in my gulliver).

re-posted/edited in 2020

Not the Best Way to Start a Day at the Beach

Low tide. About a half-mile from the beach access road—the closest people are more than 200 meters off—I swing a U-turn a bit too high off the wet-packed sand, intending to park facing the ocean. Somewhere in that sentence there should have been a descriptive adverb...a 'stupidly' or at the very least a 'thoughtlessly'.

I knew I was farged the moment I lost forward momentum, but we took a few minutes to insure it was so before calling a tow truck. Twenty minutes later the guy hooked up, pulled me forward ten feet, and gave us the bill. It cost slightly more than a dollar an inch.

Is there a combo-adverb for extremely stupid and very costly?

Mandatory Annual Cat Picture

Previous Zonkey Posts:

Older Not Smarter - 2010

Autumn Hikes - 2009

New Cat - 2009

Make Self-Service Gas Illegal

          I have an unemployed friend. Keeping a constant paycheck was a challenge for him even before the economy married the weather. (Remember when Miss Weather was only occasionally crazy in public and Mister Economy appeared strong and confident? In case you just awoke from a three-year hibernation, Mr. and Mrs. Weather-Economy are an extremely toxic couple.) Every time my friend and I talk he says, "Believe me, I'm always out there looking, but there just aren't any jobs available."

There are jobs. Plenty of them. It's just that there are none in the field he has experience in. That's the full-time-with-great-benefits field where one got paid a 40+K salary to accomplish 8-hours of actual work every 40-hour "work week".

Today, politicians don't dare open their mouths unless they can find a way to jam the words 'job creation' into every one of their paragraphs. Do they understand the difference between rhetoric and action?

My two cents: If the other 48 states (or the US congress) passed full-service gas station laws, like those in Oregon and New Jersey...with the stroke of a (governor's or president's) pen they would create tens of thousands...hundreds of thousands...over a million jobs.

     That's right, over a million jobs.

           There are approximately 240,000* self-service gas stations in the 48 US states that don't have full-service laws. A conservative estimate: five additional full-time minimum wage employees, per gas station, would be required to be hired if every state (or the US government) passed mandatory full-service gas station laws. 1.2 million new jobs.

   PROS:   Gas station attendant jobs can't be lost to oversea workers.
                        Required training and licenses prevent illegal aliens from filling these jobs.
                        Fuel spills and accidents at the station's pump are drastically eliminated.

   CONS: Price increase at the pump (about 10 cents a gallon).

   Disagree with my recommendation? Feel free to tell me why.

* 2007 census: 118,756 gas stations + 97,508 gas stations with convenience stores + 21,248 other gas stations + 10,131 stations without employees = 247,643. Oregon / New Jersey stations: 1,061 / 2,545 gas stations + 618 / 749 gas stations with convenience stores + 443 / 1,796 other gas stations = 7,212.

Can't Stop The Serenity

Last weekend I was a volunteer for CSTS at the Hollywood Theater. It's run annually by the PDX Browncoats and all profits are donated to charity.

There were over 400 fantastic theater goers watching Dr Horrible's Sing Along Blog and Serenity on the big screen, with an intermission Q&A with artist Patric Reynolds (of Dark Horse Comics fame). The after-party was relaxing-interesting, except when I verbally stumble-said brownshirts after I'd imbibed the exact-right amount of libation to make that faux pas possible (corrected immediately by every Browncoat within earshot).

Forest Camping (one more week)

Golf Trivia Challenge

Take The Golf Trivia Challenge

launch monitor - swing statistics (golf)

          I used a radar to determine my current average golf club distances. This is a first for me (and I enjoy tracking anything done for a first time). As one ages and loses muscle, one's "numbers" change. Hopefully, this will help. Too often, I'm missing the club's sweet-spot...which is lowering my carry distance.

Club (degree) Speed (mph) Loft (angle) Carry Yardage Total Yardage

Driver (10.5)        96                13.5                    222                      245
3 Wd (15)            91                11.5                    187                      207   (should be 210-carry 225-total)
5 Wd (19)            92                15                       190                      208
3 I (21)                88                17                       175                    188
4 I (23)                84                17.5                    164                      176
5 I (27)                83                18                       150                      157
6 I (30)                84                21.5                    144                      152
7 I (34)                84                23                       133                      140
8 I (37)                83                25                       122                      126
9 I (41)                78                28                       110                      113
PW (45)               73                30                         90                    91

Hypocrisy — An Invaluable Discriminator

          I recall riding in cars in the 1970's with my step-dad behind the wheel. In traffic, he would holler and gesture and 'talk a blue streak' (mom-speak) about other drivers and pedestrians. At home, he would occasionally shout at TV newscasters. In person, however, he was always polite...to a fault.

          Who was my step-dad?

          A reactionary, idiotic, rude, old man; intelligent enough to know when to filter himself? Or was he a courteous, open-minded, thoughtful person who—when safely ensconced on the other-side of a protective barrier—ranted at the occasional egregiously-behaved fool or jester? I don't know if the answer is important. I suspect it's not. But the question is.

Immediate family were the only witnesses to his bursts of vitriol. I seriously doubt he would ever have defined himself using negative verbiage of any stripe (even the concept of defining himself would have been foreign to him). I think of all the co-workers, fellow congregants, neighbors and extended family members who thought they knew him but who never witnessed him shout, "Pick a fuckin lane you miserable cunt!" or "They otta throw all those longhair-draft-dodgein-fags in the slammer!"

          If you subscribe to the belief that people 'reveal their true nature' in times when their guard is down...my step-dad was Archie Bunker wearing a Jimmy Carter mask. When I consider his behavior in the context of how it affected who I grew up to be, I focus on the hypocrisy. His lifelong struggle to keep internal-Archie mute and fabricate the external-Jimmy persona must have been immensely difficult; as difficult as a homosexual who (in 1966 America) decided at the age of thirty-nine to forevermore deny his innate attraction and marry an aging divorcée with two grade-school children before moving his ready-made family half-way across the country (this unrelated suspicion I have about my step-dad is based on very few facts; I merely include it here to suggest there were possible other hidden layers to "who he really was").

          Back to hypocrisy. I suspect it's a much more valuable discriminator than many people realize. How often do you attempt to measure someone's normally hidden hypocrisy? It's one of, if not THE primary tool I use to decide if someone is a trusted friend or merely an acquaintance.

         Here is a quote from one of the most un-hypocritical people I've ever known; I hope he remains my good friend for a long time to come: "If I'd been friends with OJ Simpson, and, back in 1994, I went to talk to him and he said to me, 'Dude, I just snapped when I saw 'em together.' Then I'd have just said, 'That's cool, let's go play golf.' But if he was all, 'Hey, I hope they catch who really did it.' Then I wouldn't have been able to stay friends with him."

          Chris's blog post Don't call me a "liberal" begins with this excerpt (above-right) of commenters on a Weather.com article about the current drought in Texas. As is often the case, give a hypocrite a protective barrier (the epitome of web-commenting) and they let their inner Archie Bunker out.

I learned from my step-dad what I didn't want to be. Who you read here is who you talk to on the phone is who you meet in person. Liberal?..ok. Hypocrite?..never.