Your Friendly Curmudgeon

I'm sure I won't blog every day, but these two articles demanded posting. Russian to their fate And this potentially dreadful news about our cousins: Experts say coronavirus could wipe out humanity’s closest living relatives - The Washington Post I'm trying to remember what I used to think about before The Virus, and its actually pretty hard. I did waste a lot of capacity thinking about sports, which doesn't seem that interesting now. But I am still obsessed with this idea: how cool would it be if the NBA formed teams by specific themes? I love this idea. Here are my examples: The all "American white guy" team The all lefty team The all two last names team The all bricklayer team (the 12 guys with the lowest shooting percentage) The all geriatric team (have to be over 35) The all "ic" team, players whose names end in ic The all dime team, players who average more assists than points The all floor team, players who can't jump. Of...

I’ve been threatening myself and the world for quite some time that I would start blogging again, but to the relief of all it hasn’t happened yet. That is until today, when boredom, fascination, and paint fumes overcame me and decided to set proverbial pen to paper again. I’m unlikely to stay with it, I would rather paint, but at least for today I will waste my ample time doing this. The elephant in the room (don’t worry, he’s by himself) of course is The Virus. Like everyone else I have been following the story and thinking about it a lot. I’ll try not to bore you with stuff you’re reading elsewhere, or anger you with political opinions, but maybe share a few original thoughts and link to some of the best stuff I’ve seen. I think there’s a great idea for a new product for these times: Odorant. Let’s apply real American ingenuity to the challenge of social distancing. The imagination swells with the possibilities… Eau De Manure, Essence of Carrion, Fleur De Funk. You’re wel...

1.       Forest Dark                              3 2.       Angel Baby                               4 3.       The Chemist                             4 4.       The Girl in the Window            5 5.       Anything is Possible                 4.5 6.       The Satanic Mechanic    ...

People often ask me, “How do you choose the books you read?” By people I mean me asking myself, no one else would really care. But I find it interesting to ask myself, so I did. I often look at Amazon’s Best Books of the Month. Even though I know they probably get paid to choose these. But they have been a pretty reliable source, other than their monthly Stephen King selection. How many Stephen Kings are there? I look for authors I have liked in the past. Unless I’ve already read 4 or more of their books, then I know I will just get annoyed that this one is too much like the other ones. And it will muddy my fond remembrances of the previous ones. I look for cover art that is designed for people like me. What does that look like? I can’t describe it, but I know it when I see it. Sort of edgy, not Oprah-ish, with some snob appeal. I read the blurbs on the back cover, and if they are written by authors I like then I will read the book. Even though I know none of them act...

I posted this a few months ago to my other blog, which is mostly about having cancer. I thought it belongs here as well.  Body Chemistry A few weeks ago I started chemotherapy again for the second time, the first being in 2015 when I underwent twelve rounds to treat pancreatic cancer. It went about as I expected. During the 48 hours of infusions and the following two days, I felt heavily drugged and crushingly fatigued, and my stomach churned with nausea and diarrhea. I spent most of five days in bed. Since the fifth day I have gradually gotten better, though my energy level is still low and I continue to have stomach discomfort. I feel pretty good now, nine days since the infusions ended, so I was recovered enough to do it all again the following Monday. But chemotherapy certainly hasn’t gotten any easier this second time around. I’ve been thinking a lot about the chemicals in our bodies this week, and coincidentally I read a couple of interesting articles that furt...

How To Fix Baseball Baseball has never been more popular, if you measure it by gross revenues. Local TV revenues are soaring, and teams are flush with cash. Nevertheless, there are trouble signs on the horizon. Games are interminably long, there are too many home runs and strike outs, and not enough base-running. Relief pitchers are beginning to dominate the game. Fewer young people are watching, the game is boring in the age of exploding entertainment options. So, I have a few modest proposals for how to fix baseball. I doubt the powers that be would consider many of them, but they should! Here they are:     Move the fences back. There are too many home runs and not enough doubles and triples. Do it now where possible, and create bigger parks over time.     Go to electronic pitch calling behind the plate. The modern pitch tracking technology is very accurate. I’ll bet the umps miss at least 15% of ball/strike calls. The systems would not replace the umpi...