Cash & Favorite Authors

I've been away for almost three weeks. Time, that slippery devil, has been rushing by without my even noticing.

          I recently saw somewhere in the news that we are soon to become a cashless society. We’re already close to that with credit and debit cards, but even those will be replaced by other, faster ways to pay for goods and services: scan an IPhone app, scan a fingerprint or eyeball, or maybe even a facial recognition device that taps directly into our savings. What happens, though, to those who don’t have a bank account or someone who simply wants to stay off the grid? How do they pay for goods and services? I guess they’d have to go back to a barter system. But that would certainly be awkward. This whole concept of money confuses me. Cash, or money (paper certificates and metal coins), represents an amount of value that members of a world society agree on. So, if the U.S. goes cashless, wouldn’t the rest of the world also have to follow suit? And what if not all foreign nations agree? Very confusing. It also seems like the only way to make it work would be to require everyone to have a bank account somewhere in The Cloud, whether they wanted one or not. Very confusing. It would also be one more step toward Big Brotherhood, with everyone having to be in some huge data base holding our fingerprints, eyeballs, and faces. Very confusing, too Big Brotherish for me.

          Once again, I’m weeding out all the books I’ve already read or never intend to read, packing them up to donate to Good Will or Disabled American Vets or any other of the charitable organizations that accepts books. It’s another step in my getting rid of unnecessary “stuff” before I die. The book weeding is a slow, solemn business, because I have to kiss them all goodbye as I pack them up, sigh over their leaving. In doing so, I’ve noted which authors I’ve most often read, which series I’ve followed. Odd how many are men, how few are women (14 men, 5 women). That’s not a gender bias, just an odd fact in my odd book choices. Of the male authors, I guess my favorite would be John D. MacDonald and his Travis McGee, followed closely by Ed McBain and the 87^th Precinct, Lawrence Block and Matt Scudder, Robert B. Parker and Spenser and Jesse Stone, John Sandford and Lucas Davenport and Virgil Flowers, Lee Child and Jack Reacher, and James Lee Burke and Dave Robicheaux. The other seven I’ve read religiously but they don’t stack up to my top seven—Dick Francis and jockeys, Dutch Leonard and a wild variety of protagonists, Jeffrey Deaver and Lincoln Rhyme, Robert Crais and Elvis Cole, Michael Connelly and Harry Bosch, Jonathan Kellerman and Alex Delaware, and James W. Hall and Thorn. All of them are old friends and I’ll miss them, but time marches on. The five female authors on my list are Kate Atkinson, Tess Gerritsen, Laura Lippman, Tami Hoag, and J. A. Jance. But I don’t give them kisses as they go, maybe a brief hug or a little pat on the head. My next giveaway will probably involve gold clubs and golf accessories. And I’ll probably weep over their passing just as I sigh over the books I’ve loved.

Stray Thoughts & A Quiet Place

          I can’t find any good reason for not setting term limits on members of both Houses. After, let’s say, twelve years, most of them would be old and infirm and should be replaced by someone younger and more fit. If not a term limit, then how about an age limit, like no one older than 70? We need to weed our garden.

          I also can’t find any good reason for not setting campaign spending limits for all elected officials. Why should the amount of money spent on mud-slinging and campaign promises determine the outcome? A multibillionaire can win any election if he’s willing to spend some of his fortune, but what happens when that mega-rich person gets elected, despite that person’s total political ignorance? Or his/her just plain ignorance? Look at what we now have in the Oval Office. I rest my case.

          What can I take away from the recent Masters? Exciting, gorgeous, dramatic. And I even saw some things I’d never before seen anywhere on a golf course—a ball that was putted into a bunker (Bubba), a 40-yard hook around trees and onto a green (Bubba again), a 30-yard slice from Leishman around trees and onto the green. What else caught my eye? Poor Sergio’s five balls in the water on #15, resulting in an octuple-bogey 13, a near perfect come-from-behind win by Spieth, a McIlroy situation on #13 where he found the azaleas behind the green and had very few options (no going back on a line since that would only put him deeper in the woods, no unplayable lie since two clubs wouldn’t get him out, or go back to the last spot and hit again, or just try to bully it out of the flowers, which he did), a resurgent Tiger, and a relatively unpopular winner in Patrick Reed. I hope I live long enough to see the next Augusta get-together.

          I’m continually amazed at the quality and maturity of so many young contestants on The Voice. I’m also amazed and surprised at the maturity and poise of so many of the young students from Stoneman Douglas High School. They renew my faith in the next generation that will lead us out of calamity.

          The tv tribute to Elton John a few nights ago was wonderful, with so many young singers taking on Elton John hits. Among the best of them was John Legend and Lady Gaga. I wish both of them would spend more time on American standards, especially Lady Gaga, whose voice is remarkably rich and pitch-perfect. Come on, Lady G, give up the shtick and sing “Lush Life” over and over again.

         

The reviews of A Quiet Place were good enough that I really wanted to see it. It was very good, but not quite up to what the reviewers were saying. The use of silence for raising tension was excellent and the plot was simple enough not to interfere with the characters and their need for silence. A man and his wife (John Krasinski and Emily Blunt) and their children (Millicent Simmonds and Noah Jupe) are living on a farm not far outside New York City. We learn early on that blind aliens have taken over the earth, killing most of the humans. They are like very large skitterish spiders with snickety heads right out of Sigourney Weaver’s worst nightmare, with hearing so keen that any sound will bring them down on whatever is making that sound. So the family uses only sign language to communicate with each other. Simple plot. The score behind the alien scenes sort of echoes the screaming violins we heard in the shower scene in Psycho, enough to really make one’s hair stand on end. Simple plot. What do they have to do to survive? You’ll see. But there are so many flaws in the logic that I couldn’t overlook them. No spoilers here, just some references to things you might consider if you go to see it: sand (Where did it all come from?), water (How could that much flow from a broken bathroom pipe?), electricity (Are their solar panels enough?), bright, shiny nail (Why hadn’t they noticed it earlier and how did it get there?). Also, a few other questions: Did the aliens eat humans or just kill them? How did the aliens arrive and how many were there? What was their purpose for killing off life? Lots of questions, too few answers. But go see it anyway.

Countdown: I’m happy to say that my clock is running backwards. With a lot of help from Rosalie, I even managed to make it to a Harkins theater for a movie (see above) without too much shortness of breath. And I just got something from Amazon that’s a miracle aid for another physical problem of mine. From so many hours of sitting on one chair or another, day after day after day, my right butt cheek developed a sore spot very much like a bed sore (from poor blood circulation). It hurts like the devil and doesn’t want to heal because I sit on it so much. I ordered a butt donut for folks who suffer from hemorrhoids. It works beautifully. Now, with a little help from Neosporin, it should heal.

Masters, AI, Plastic Island

          It’s Masters week. Finally. I don’t know if anyone else is as excited as I am about this year’s play at August, but from the early coverage on the Golf Channel of the Monday through Wednesday practice rounds, it seems that everyone is ready and eager to watch the competition. Even though this upsurge in anticipation is mainly about Tiger’s return, this field is the strongest in a long time, with at least ten players who could win. There will be no Danny Willet who sneaks in this year. In fact, Willet won’t come even close to making the cut after two rounds. We who are golfers can’t wait to see who will prevail. But even hordes of non-golfers will be watching. I’d guess that tv viewing will be up between thirty and fifty percent over any past years. And most of the hype is because of Tiger. Isn’t it odd that only a few years ago, after the sordid tales of his adultery and subsequent divorce, many golfers as well as non-golfers were against him? And now we have the new, surgically repaired, more humane Tiger, and most of us are rooting for him. I hope he wins. But I wouldn’t be unhappy to see Spieth, Johnson, Mickelson, Rose, or even Garcia win it. I want the drama, the hutzpah, the magical moments and magical shots. I just don’t want another Danny Willet. Come on, Thursday, you can’t come soon enough.

          Another look at the A.I. movement. The accidental death of a woman struck by a driverless Uber auto has a bunch of folks now apprehensive about driverless cars and saying they will never ride in a driverless car. Not going to happen, folks. It’s a done deal. In the blink of an eye, there will be only cars that drive themselves. In an article about the accident, the writer said, in the near future, we’ll be boarding pilotless planes. On that same subject, I read that Steinway is now making a grand player piano that will play any classical music perfectly and with as much feeling as when a human plays it. Huh. I thought that why we had dvd’s and vinyl disks. Why do we now need a really expensive piano to do what dvd’s and disks can do?

          On Sixty Minutes, I saw that we now have an island in the pacific made up entirely of the world’s plastic debris, twice the size of Texas. Twice the size of Texas. I can’t seem to make that fit in my head. Twice the size of Texas. What can we do about it and what are the long-term consequences if we do nothing? It’s just another of the many things that drive me crazy.

Countdown: My doomsday clock hasn’t gotten any closer to midnight. I’m now in a holding pattern, no worse but still no better in terms of my energy levels. My last blood examination showed that I’m anemic, just not making enough red blood cells to provide for a proper amount of oxygen. There are many causes for anemia and I seem to be the unlucky recipient of many of them. Taking too much aspirin can cause blood thinning that leads to low red corpuscle production. Improper diet can lead to lowered production. Inflammatory diseases like rheumatoid arthritis can decrease red cells. Check. Got that. Bone marrow deficiency, check, got that (my diagnosis of myelodysplasia is indicative of marrow deficiency). So, what can I do to rectify this problem? Stop taking aspirin. Start taking lots of vitamin B-12 and folic acid.  Eat a diet that contains more of the above. Maybe even have a transfusion of blood rich in red cells. That will be my main question for my pulmonologist when I see him—what should I do?