MY FINAL FORTY

March Madness is down to its Final Four.  My pick?  There is just so much hype about Calipari versus Pitino, but all worthy of media play.  Kentucky should beat Louisville and go on to be the final one.

Major League Baseball, if you blinked, just completed two games in Tokyo, with Seattle and Oakland splitting to start the season.  Which is a good time as any to warn you about April 1, coming up this Sunday.

In 1988 when The Tokyo Dome first opened, the Japan Times published on April 1 a story that their new stadium would need to be moved 40 yards north or the Yomiuri Giants would finish last, for the "Big Egg (nickname)" sat on a Shinto Shrine. You would think the proffered solution--filling the dome with helium and floating it 40 yards--would give a hint as to the seriousness.  But, no, I happened to be in the city that day, and while funny, nevertheless caused consternation for a Nation that was not aware of this sort of prank traditionally perpetrated in the USA.  The stock value of the Giants parent company and those associated with the stadium all fell.

Since then, there is something every year, as for example, in 2005, Ueno Zoo announced that they had discovered a giant penguin called the Tonosama Penguin, and said it's favorite dish was white fish with soy sauce.  The accompanying photo was their zoo director, Teruyuki Komiya, in costume.

The American opening day is Wednesday, April 4, but only with one game at the brand new Marlins Park in Miami involving Miami and St. Louis, the defending champion.  As it is known to rain in Florida, the stadium has a retractable roof.  There are only 37,000 seats and the cost was slightly higher than half a billion dollars.  With the humidity and size (340 feet left, 416 ft center and 335 ft right), this is destined to be a pitcher's park.  It is located on the site of the former Orange Bowl in Little Havana, 2 miles west of downtown Miami.

All the above is just to set the state for the rest of my life, which has been divided by various periods of the number four, a bad luck omen in Japan because SHI sounds like death.  Four is also the dreaded number in China.  For example, you never give a gift of four melons in Japan, but mainly, in this specific case, because one musk melon can cost $250.

Anyway, my baby period lasted four years until I went to Muriel Pre-School, when added to my K-6 years at Pohukaina Elementary, gives a sum of eight years.  The odd school terms were Central Intermediate School and McKinley High School, which only lasted 3 years each.  However, my time at Stanford University for a B.S. in chemical engineering and LSU for a PhD in biochemical engineering also only each lasted a bit over three and a half years, but those round off to four.  I joined the University of Hawaii in 1972 and forty years later, still occupy an office on the Manoa Campus.  Wow, it has been forty years!  However, I retired in January of 2000, and it is this final forty year cycle to 2040, when I become a hundred years old, that is the focus of this posting.

During the first twelve years of my retirement, I wrote three books and published more than a 100 articles in The Huffington Post.  My four year period with HuffPo is over, I've graduated, but should I sign on for another four with Planet Earth and Humanity?  Is it worth my while to try to save our globe and society?  My first contribution was on 29April2008, and after 1471 postings, I have a month to decide if I continue for another four, or, perhaps, 24, years when I gain centenarian status (Why not maintain my optimistic nature?).  What do I plan to do over the next 28 years?  I'm not sure, but that is the best part of this all.  I can do almost anything I want.  Stay tuned.