MAGIC CAN HAPPEN IF YOU TRY

 I have lived a charmed life, made so by moments of magic.

• I'm 86 years old, healthy and happy.
• I have not yet spent a night as a patient in any hospital.
• I've had two personal relationships that were important to what I am today.  I'll keep these private.
• I've accumulated more than 3 million air miles, mostly on Star Alliance.

• 
  Been on a dozen, or two, cruises.
• Have had maybe 15 around the world trips.
• Written five books.
• Worked on the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence for NASA.
• Wrote the the legislation that became law for hydrogen when I worked in the U.S. Senate.
• In my 27th year of retirement.

Not sure who said SOMETIMES MAGIC CAN HAPPEN IF YOU TRY.  Checked with various AI sources and got nothing.

In a way, though, that thought has driven me through most of my life.  The first time was when I was a junior in high school.  

• 
  That was 70 years ago.
• Through all of my life as a student, I was just above average.  In my sophomore year at McKinley High School in Honolulu I was not in the top English/Social Studies class.
• I have noticed that I don't one day just try something new.  Something traumatic needs to happen to my life to kick me out of my normal ennui.  In 1956 my family got evicted from our home in Kakaako by Ward Estates when they began to develop what is now Ward Village.

• 
  We moved to Kalihi, and I had to catch a bus my final two years at McKinley.
• In my junior year, I had two fabulous teachers, Mildred Kosaki in English/Social Studies (I must have done reasonably well in my sophomore year because I was promoted to this top junior class) and Sueko Hirokawa in the sciences.  I have a posting about these two teachers, titled CROSSROADS:  Stanford University.
• 
  This article also traced why I chose to even try to get into Stanford.
• A second trauma occurred, breaking my wrist, which led me into more magic.  
• I end with the rest of this story from that posting.

An incredible series of luck helped.  First, my family was forced to move away from Kakaako at the end of my sophomore year at McKinley. (This was the necessary trauma.)  My gang was just a bunch of loyal friends.   There was a dozen of us and by the time everyone got together we were almost always late to our home rooms.  This meant we were penalized by being kept after school for an hour.  Frankly, there was nothing in their attitude that compromised my studies, but the physical separation I think was a factor in changing my general attitude about my future.

Second, students (from public schools in Honolulu) normally worked in the pineapple cannery between their junior and senior years.  I broke my wrist playing basketball in April.  (The trauma.)  This resulted in, perhaps, two most important consequences:

• I had never run for any kind of office in my life (and since then never did again).  I don't know how this happened, but I found myself campaigning for Senior Class vice president against three females, one who was heavily favored, and went on to later becoming Narcissus Queen.  The combination of gender ratio advantage and the cast on my wrist was just enough for me to prevail.  As vice president I also was to become chairman of the commencement and a bunch of other leadership roles.
• As I couldn't work in the cannery, I decided to memorize the words in a guide on how to do well on the Scholastic Aptitude Test.  After just a couple of months of this intensive activity, my verbal score improved from the 200's to high 600's, with my math score close to 800, the maximum.

In my sophomore year some of my friends on the tennis team asked me to join them, as they were short of members.  Never having played before, from the end of my sophomore year to much of my senior year I must have spent 690 out of 700 days on the courts, which was the norm for the group.  In those days McKinley and Roosevelt were the only public schools competing against Punahou, Iolani, Kamehameha and Mid-Pac.  Those private schools gave tennis scholarships, so we should have had no real chance of beating them.  But we did, and by, again, a fate of  luck, I was the third singles, which meant I was the fifth best player on the team, as the third and fourth served as the first doubles.  Each private school only had a few scholarship players, and when it came to their fifth best, they were no better than I was.  So I proceeded to win most of my matches, if not all of them, even though I would not have been able to beat the top players from McKinley. (This was the only athletic activity I had in my Stanford application form.  This box had to be checked.)

While in my sophomore year I was a below average student, by the end of my senior year, I was among the best students in the state, for I went on to win various honors, like the Bausch and Lomb Science medal, an Elks Scholarship, a Science Fair award, had both a poem and an essay published in a national anthology and carried pretty much a straight A average.

A school like Stanford not only looks at your grade average and SAT scores.  The extra-curricula activities are maybe more important.  It was not like in high school I had reached a certain crossroad and dedicated my life to accumulating all these impacting factors like class officership, success on my tennis team and high college board scores.  Those things, mostly through luck and circumstances, just happened.  (Again, traumas and acts of magic.)

Thus, I never even bothered to apply to the University of Hawaii.  I just took a chance on Stanford and the California Institute of Technology.  CalTech accepted me, and that was my first choice, for they only accepted around 250/year and was generally considered to be the most difficult school to get into.  However, their financial package was limited.  Luckily, Stanford provided a full scholarship with tuition waiver, room and board paid and a part time job working in the library.  In follow-up discussions with teachers and counselors I picked Stanford.  CalTech would have led me into a totally different way of life.

If I had at the beginning analyzed the reality and also the economics of going away to college, any kind of common sense would have convinced me to stay home for college.  This experience of shooting for the best against all odds, and succeeding, changed my whole life attitude.  Then, graduating from Stanford provided the most important payoff:  CONFIDENCE.  

But the key combination was unpredictable trauma, followed by successful comeback, leading to a magical conclusion.  This fusion has occurred throughout my life. 

Even worked on laser fusion at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory.  But my time there was just another eventual act of magic.

A lot more magic after I graduated, which could form the basis of a future posting.  A more recent bit of magic was moving into 15 Craigside, a senior's community.

• I've now been here 12 years.
• Life is secure and comfortable.
• Here is our meal schedule for this week.

• 
  Not quite CHOCOLATE, CAVIAR, FOIE GRAS AND TRUFFLES EXTRAVAGANZA ON THE SILVER WHISPER, the title of a day on our cruise from which we returned earlier this month.  And I should add champagne, vodka, wine and more.

• 
  But too much of that kind of food is just good for my body.  The five-week trip we took to the Total Solar Eclipse in Iceland and Greenland resulted in my gaining 12 pounds, which I was shocked to learn was physically possible for me.  How did that trip go?

• SO HOW WAS OUR LATEST TRIP?: Part 3
• SO HOW WAS OUR LATEST TRIP?: Part 2
• SO HOW WAS OUR LATEST TRIP?

• 
  The good news is that through simple dieting, still consuming meals like what you see above, plus a lot of soup and salad meals, I lost 12.5 pounds in 9 days at 15 Craigside.  By all measures, this was like magic, for I didn't think this was attainable.
• I also found out why my knees ached when I walked.  I was too heavy.  The pain went away when I lost 12.5 pounds.  Can you image how much added stress carrying a ten pound bag of sugar, and two additional pounds, can do to your joints?
• My next bit of magic?  

To close, a few cartoons from the Stanford Daily.

Stanford and Cal Berkely are close rivals.

You won't know what this final cartoon is all about unless you are familiar with the Stanford Marshmallow Test.

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A CENTURY OF TONY BENNETT

I was on my way to completing Part 3 of the series on My Family, when I instead thought I would rather today tell the story of Tony Bennett.

• About that title, he actually passed away in 2023, but if he lived, he would have turned 100 last month.
• Was born Anthony Dominick Benedetto in New York City in 1926.  Father ailed, so the family grew up in poverty.
• Began singing at the age of 10, the year his father passed away.
• At 13 was a singing waiter in Italian restaurants in New York City.

• 
  Drafted into the army near end of World War II, and spent some time in the European front line he would later described as a front-row seat in hell.  Several times escaped death.  Left the military as a Private First Class.
• Pearl Bailey and Bob Hope helped Tony get started in 1949, with Hope suggesting a shortened name, Tony Bennett.
• At the age of 24, signed to Columbia Records in 1950, with Mitch Miller producing and Percy Faith providing the orchestral arrangement, released in 1951 was Because of You.  Hi #1 and stayed there for 10 weeks.
• Later that year covered Hank Williams' Cold, Cold Heart, doing Williams a favor, from country music was not too popular with the masses.
• 
  Three wives and four children.  In 2008 with third wife Susan Crow.
• Sold more than 50 million records, won 50 Grammys and has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
• After those two hits, Rags to Riches followed in 1953, topping the charts for 8 weeks.
• Later that year, recorded Stranger in Paradise, which also became #1.
• The rock and roll era arrived in 1955, and he lost popularity.  Stayed active on TV shows.

• 
  His signature song, I Left My Hear in San Francisco, in 1962 was a 10-year old little known song.  Won him a Grammy for Record of the Year and Best Male Solo Performance.  Especially memorable for me because I graduated from Stanford that year and also left the Bay area.
• Was a firm believer in the Civil Right Movement, and participated in the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches.  Performed in the rally the night before Martin Luther's Our God is Marching On speech in Alabama.
• 
  Never really stopped entertaining, but by the end of the 70s, had no recording contract, no manager, only now and then performances in Las Vegas and problems with the Internal Revenue Service.  
• Had a near-fatal cocaine overdose in 1979.
• Called his sons Danny and Dae for help.
• Danny became his manager and Dae served as recording engineer.  Later, daughter Antonia joined him in shows.

• 
  Successfully staged comebacks, and in 1999 had assets worth $15 to $20 million.  Quoted to say at 73 that he had no intention of retiring, indicating that Pablo Picasso, Jack Benny and Fred Astaire kept active until the day they died.  
• On tour at a rate of 100 shows per year by the end of the 1990s, making a point singing Fly Me to the Moon without microphone to demonstrate his skills at vocal projection.

• 
  Churned out albums and kept donating his time to charitable and Democratic political causes.  Gained a nickname, Tony Benefit.  Received a major United Nations Humanitarian Award.
• Turned 80 in 2006 and won a Grammy.  Tony Bennett:  An American Classic on NBC won multiple Emmys.
• Guest-mentored in season 6 of American Idol, and performed in the finale.

• 
  In 2008 made two appearances with Billy Joel in Shea Stadium, then a Christmas album with the Count Basie Big Band.
• In 2010, among other appearances, sand I Left My Heart in San Francisco at AT&T Park before Game 1 of the World Series, and sang God Bless America during the 7th inning stretch.

• 
  In 2011 at the age of 85 released his first collaborative albums with Aretha Franklin, Willie Nelson, Queen Latifah and Lady Gaga.  A duet with Amy Winehouse on Body and Soul, the last recording she made.  Charted on the Billboard Hot 100, an album debuting at  #1, making him the oldest living artist artist to appear there.
• Performed at SF City Hall commemorating the 2012 World Series victory by the San Francisco Giants.

• 
  In 2014 performed in Israel for the first time, and later that year, released an album with Lady Gaga, Cheek to Cheek that debuted at #1 on Billboard.  He was 88.   Went on tour with her.
• In 2015 again performed in the World Series.

• 
  In 2016 was diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease, but he continued performing.
• On 1August2016, at 90 was honored by the unveiling of an 8-foot statue in his likeness in front of the Fairmont Hotel In SFO.  Performed I Left My Heart in San Francisco, for this is where he first sang that song, in 1961.

• 
  His final album, again with Lady Gaga, Love for Sale, in 2021.  Final live performance with her at the Radio City Music Hall on August 3 and 5, 2021.  He sang his signature song.
• 
  Retired on 12August2021, nine days after his 95th birthday.  However, a final TV appearance with Lady Gaga on 16December2021.
• Continued to rehearse three time/week into 2022.
• Had some success as painter Anthony Benedetto.
• Passed away 21July2023.
• A rare 2018 interview, only published last week.

Well, now to some current events.  The United Nations has been hopeless about engendering World Peace.  However, this is the only organization capable of making a difference.  However, President Donald Trump addressed the General Assembly in New York City this morning.  Reported TIME magazine:

On Tuesday, Trump delivered his fifth speech to UNGA. The tone of humility and the invitations for collaboration were long gone. In its place were Trump’s dark worldview about the U.N. itself, and questionable boasts about his domestic poll numbers.

Over the course of 56 meandering minutes, Trump nursed grievances large and small, with complaints that he had to walk up to the hall because the escalator was broken and barbs for Joe Biden aplenty.

The remarks, his longest ever to the global confab and going well beyond his allocated time, stood as a sharp reminder that Trump sees his turn on these stages as a chance for self-promotion. He cast the United Nations as a passive observer of global affairs that would be lost without him, as he continued his shameless campaign for a Nobel Peace Prize for ending, by his count, seven wars.

In this speech, he also said he is deciding whether to annihilate Iran.....or make a deal.  In other words, same old, same old.  But getting worse is Trump's popularity:

CNN political director David Chalian on Tuesday highlighted a brand-new poll from the network on President Donald Trump and his ongoing war on Iran, arguing that voter confidence in Trump's handling of the conflict marks "the worst number" for him across the entire survey.

"CNN has a brand-new poll out this morning that finds just 29% of Americans approve of how the president is handling foreign affairs," "The Situation Room" co-host Pamela Brown explained. "This is a new low in CNN polling across both of his terms as president."

42 days to the mid-term elections.  If he doesn't postpone it.

To close, another major hurricane in the Pacific Ocean.  Hurricane Polo is now a super-hurricane.

• Yesterday, at 40 MPH, 0300 GMT
•                      85 MPH, 2100 GMT
• Today       165 MPH, 1800 GMT
• Off Mexico, on a path west of Baha.

Rather unusual, but Tropical Storm Odalys was heading towards Hawaii, but today will make a sudden right turn, become a hurricane, and head for Baha.

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MY LIFE: Part 1b

On Sunday, I indicated that my life had three 27-year periods after the age of 5, and provided details of the first trio, but only got through high school.  Today, I will complete this initial educational cycle with Stanford University, an important learning experience in the Hawaiian sugar industry, then graduate school.

• So in 1958 I left Hawaii for the first time.
• My brother by then was working at the Naval Civil Engineering Center in Port Hueneme, California.  I stayed with his family that summer, for he secured for me a summer job at this center.

• 
  Stanford was a challenge, for I was below average, again, in all facets of life, sociologically, economically and intellectually.

• 
  There were no Black students, Hispanics were not yet even identified and I was the only student of Japanese ethnicity.
• Actually, there was one Black in 1891, the year the school opened, Ernest Houston Johnson.  He graduated in 1895 in economics, but sadly died of tuberculosis in 1898 at the age of 26.  He is seated at the bottom left in this photo.
• Numbers 2 and 3 came in 1960.

• 
  Turned out, though, that the philosophy of Stanford was that anyone they recruited deserved to eventually graduate, so maximize your life experience.  A successful person, they felt, should be well-rounded and flexible.  Thus, studying became a secondary requirement.  I took more art courses than in my major.

• 
  I managed to wade through 3 years and 9 months of academics with a B.S. degree in chemical engineering and something truly important, confidence.
• President John F. Kennedy had just created the Peace Corps in 1962, and several of my closest classmates chose to earn nothing but a stipend, $75/month, which accrued and paid out at the completion of their two-year humanitarian service.  There was a modest living allowance to cover living costs at places in Africa and the South Pacific.

• 
  I toyed with the idea of pursuing my interest in art, and almost went to Sophia University in Tokyo. I couldn't afford to do this, so I perhaps wisely chose another path, which was to find a real job.

• 
  I did not want to sacrifice that much, but had to somewhat compromise my choice of employment, so chose to "save" the sugar industry back home in Hawaii.  
• I made $500/month, with free housing as a trainee.

• 
  Was sent to C. Brewer's Hutchinson Sugar Company in Naalehu on the Big Island of Hawaii, the southernmost place in the USA.  In 1962, there was not only no TV, but no radio during day because the distance and mountains.

• 
  Found a nurse named Pearl who worked in the adjacent town of Pahala in September of 1962, and we got married in December.
• But the Army then had a draft system, and my number was low enough that I would have been called.  So I joined the Army Reserve and was sent to basic training then service, a six-month absence that was physically trying for me.

• 
  But I survived, so when I returned to sugar, the company sent me for further training in Kilauea, Kauai.
• I was there for a week, living in a cottage with my wife and her dog, Pepper, a large part-German Shepherd, where our backyard was the Slippery Slide in the recently completed movie South Pacific.  Click on that too watch the full 2 hour 35 minute film.
• 
  Bloody Mary sang Happy Talk to France Nuyen and John Kerr in the pool below our waterfall.  My wife Pearl looked like Nuyen, and they were born in the same month and year, France in France.

• 
  Found out from a very old man living in Kilauea that he had known my grandfather.  Took me until retirement to later find out further information about how Kenjiro Takahashi had left Japan in the later 1890s for the USA, and in 1903 or so stopped off at Kilauea, where he got married and sired my father.  Kenjiro (I was named after him) was exceptional, and was in charge of building the first hydroelectric plant on Kauai.  Unfortunately, he died at the site in 1906 just before the facility was dedicated.  Here is a photo of me at the site more than a century later, and this powerplant was still producing 3MW.

• 
  Kenjiro's gravestone in Kilauea.
• I spent 1963 in Kilauea, a very dry year on Kauai, but excellent for harvesting and refining sugar cane, so that the average production doubled.  C. Brewer had a financial system of profit-sharing, and my portion, which almost doubled my salary, was used to for me to later purchase my first apartment.
• 
  Was hired back at Hutchinson on the Big Island, where I worked until 1968.  Toughest job I ever had in my life, but an important part of my future success.
• I told Bill Baldwin, plantation manager, that I would be quitting to back to graduate school.  He arranged for me get full salary to do so, but only if I went to Louisiana State University, for the chemical engineering department had the only sugar technology program in the world.  LSU had the second largest chemical engineering department in the nation.
• 
  Thus, in 1969 we found ourselves in Baton Rouge, and as Pearl was a registered nurse, with a full fellowship and salary from C. Brewer, actually saved money for the only time in our married life.
• However, I wanted to get a PhD, and talked the company into allowing me to stay,  They said okay, and we'd work out a settlement when I returned to Hawaii, but cut off my salary.

• 
  Three years and seven months later upon matriculation, I got a PhD in biochemical engineering, and a position with the College of Engineering at the University of Hawaii, starting in August of 1972, ending the 27-year  educational phase of my life.
• One summer I wrote an environmental report for C. Brewer and they called us even.

To come next, the second 27-year period.  From starting at the University of Hawaii, spending time at the NASA Ames Research Center on the Search for Extraterretrial Intelligence, a couple of assignments at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory on laser fusion, three years with the U.S. Senate and a range of other activities until retirement in 1999.

The top news of the day remains the war in Iran.  As peace is slow to come, I only show a couple of cartoons, which came out two months ago, that still make sense.  The war itself is now a little more than 3 months old.

Three big upcoming American sporting events.

• ABC covers both the Stanley Cup finals--Vegas Golden Knights vs Carolina Hurricane)--in North Carolina from tonight, and NBA finals--San Antonio Spurs at New York Knicks--tomorrow night.  Both are best of seven, and this network has managed to arrange that there will never be a conflict, even if they go seven, with hockey ending on Wednesday, June 17, and basketball on Friday, June 19.  And, yes, Mayor Zohran Mamdani did repeal kids' bedtimes during the Knicks' NBA finals quest.

• 
  The first game of the FIFA World Cup is next week, June 11, when Mexico hosts South Africa in Mexico City.  The initial U.S. match will be on June 12 against Paraguay in SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California.

I've been tracking Typhoon Jangmi for more than a week.  The computer model was absolutely accurate, for the wind speed declined to tropical storm strength, and the eye arrived a day early, and will today be in the ocean parallel to Tokyo.

In the East Pacific, the first ocean storm will form in the next few days, south and to the east of Hawaii.

And bad news for Hawaii, for NOAA has predicted a 70% chance of a busy hurricane season for Hawaii.  

• But the prognosis is iffy, for the probability is 5 to 13 storms of at least tropical strength.  
• Normally, the prediction is 4 or 5 of these. 
• Last year there were only 4 tropical cyclones.
• I told Google AI that the islands of Hawaii, Maui and Oahu have never experienced a full hurricane in recorded history.  The response.

You are essentially correct! In modern recorded history, the Big Island, Maui, and Oahu have not experienced a direct hit from a full-strength hurricane's center.

• However:  According to historical research from the University of Hawaii SOEST, meteorological evidence suggests a severe storm—potentially a major hurricane—punched through the Big Island and Maui in August 1871. [1]
• 
  In 1992, though, Hurricane Iniki made landfall over Kauai,
• Wind gusts were at 175 MPH at landfall.
• There were sustained winds of from 100  to 120 MPH through most of the island.
• Stephen Spielberg got trapped on the island while filming Jurassic Park.  Watch this video.
• Read about my experience with Iniki:

For my nostalgic entry today, I'll share a short story about my non-encounter with Hurricane Iniki.  It was on my birthday, 6September1992:

I remember this period well because I spent my birthday the next day in Eugene, with my wife and brother plus wife, where we went on the 7th to a football game where the University of Hawaii beat Oregon.  That day a nondescript depression became Tropical Storm Iniki.  On September 9 it was upgraded to Hurricane Iniki.  We were driving to Colorado Springs, but spent September 10 in a Salt Lake City motel.  I turned on the TV and saw Iniki appearing to be just south of Honolulu.  I tried to call contacts back home, but could not reach anyone.  

On September 11 Hurricane Iniki at a peak of 145 MPH struck Kauai.  However, the Navy's Makaha Ridge radar station recorded a gust of 227 MPH.  Six were killed and damages of up to $10 billion (in 2019 dollars) were caused.  

We went to the UH-Air Force game, won by Hawaii, 6-3. 

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