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วันอังคารที่ 24 กันยายน พ.ศ. 2562

HOW TO GAIN A "SMART" REPUTATION

General intelligence helps, but keeping up-to-date on popular topics, can go a long way in making you appear to be smart.  One way to get there is quite simple:  read this blog daily.

Let's go back to a week ago:


The general sense is, of course trees are good.  Not necessarily:
  • trees not only absorb carbon dioxide and produce oxygen, but also generate methane, which can be a hundred times worse, per molecule, than carbon dioxide
  • unfortunately, when trees die, they return all the carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere over time
  • under certain conditions, this decaying biomass can further increase the methane discharge
Read that article to seem educated.

Have you been keeping up with global warming this week?  First the worldwide School Strike for Climate, also known as Fridays for the Future and Youth for Climate.  The movement began in 2015 when students invited other students to skip school on the first day of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris.  50,000 from 100 countries participated.  

Then last year 9th grade Swedish schoolgirl Greta Thunberg staged a protest outside the Swedish parliament holding a sign, School Strike for the Climate.  This year, she came by sailboat to New York City to spur the worldwide school strike which took place on September 20.  Then she spoke to the UN Climate Summit yesterday.

President Donald Trump?  Against all odds, he actually showed up and gave a short speech touching on religion.  However:


So what else happened at the UN Climate Action Summit?  Nothing much.  India, Russia and China indicated they intended to ratify the Paris Agreement, and interjected sarcasm about the USA.  All talk, for coal use is actually increasing, and no diminution is in sight.  All this inaction with leaders reluctantly noticing that the latest five years have been the warmest on record.  Laurence Tubiana from France said it best regarding the message from young people and the subsequent reaction:  We hear you...but they are tone-deaf.

The glare of the week?  Greta Thunberg at Donald Trump at his entrance.

Here is her message:  How dare you!!!  She is now 16-years old.  Imagine you going back to 16 and taking on the United Nations, and, also too, the leader of the Free World.


Totally changing subjects, the next day after my climate warming posting last week:


My prediction?

My favorite to win is Kodi Lee.  He is even more memorable than Susan Boyle from Britain's Got Talent. Kodi's first audition. 

Kodi won.......his winning performance.  You think you got problems?  Kodi is blind and autistic.  Here is a clip on what AGT didn't tell you about him, before he won.  

About this most popular summer show for more than a decade, here are 10 AGT winners and where they are now.  Ever heard of Shin Lim?  Not only was he an AGT winner, but he got #1 on the recent AGT Champions competition.  Shin also just got married on Maui, to Casey Thomas.

This posting is long enough, but let me segue from my blog of yesterday (just scroll down) about tailgates and football, by commenting on the game of the year:  UCLA 67 - Washington State 63.  In 1916 Georgia Tech defeated Cumberland 222-0, so 130 points in regulation does not seem like much.

Plus, there were extenuating circumstances, for Cumberland College had discontinued its football program before the season, but somehow showed up for the game anyway.  Plus, earlier in the year, Cumberland had embarrassed Georgia Tech, running up a 22-0 demolishment in baseball.  Thus, GT coach John Heisman felt justified to show Cumberland a lesson.  Oh, the Heisman Trophy is named after him.

Plus, it was only last year that Texas A&M beat LSU in seven overtimes, 74-72.  I watched that game, which lasted almost 5 hours.  And it was only a dozen years ago that Navy prevailed over North Texas, 74-62, with no overtime period.

But back to that  UCLA-Washington State game, here are all the highlights.  Worth wasting 14 minutes of your life.  UCLA deserved this:
  • They got all the bad breaks.
  • Were behind in the second half 49-17.  Their coach, Chip Kelly, could have been fired if they lost by this margin.
  • Entering the game, Wazoo has undefeated and UCLA had not won a game.
  • 1,377 yards total offense
  • 1,077 combined passing yards at 66.7% completion rate.
  • The over/under total was 60.
  • 56 first downs.
  • UCLA score 50 points in the second half.
  • Anthony Gordon of Wazzu threw 9 touchdown passes, breaking Gardner Minshew's (he is to the right) record of 7, and he actually watched the game.  As a rookie quarterback, Minshew had just led the Jacksonville Jaguars to its first win on Thursday night.  The NCAA record is 11 by David Klingler of Houston in 1990.   The NFL record is only 5 passing touchdowns.  Looking at these records, I noticed that Timmy Chang of the University of Hawaii had the most career interceptions at 80.  Cole McDonald has a long way to go.
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วันจันทร์ที่ 23 กันยายน พ.ศ. 2562

OX-TAIL, HAMBURGER, WAGYU, MORE WAGYU and DANIEL JONES

Tail-gate, week 5, featured beef.  It all began Friday night after I had a plant-based Impossible Whopper for lunch, followed by  walking 9 holes at the Ala Wai Golf Course.  I worry a bit too much about sodium in my diet, but all that sweat on the course neutralized that potential problem for what I was planning for my meal:  15 Craigside provided the ox-tail soup and salad; I bought the poke and accoutrements, plus the drinks.  

Ever wonder what is done with the tail of the cattle or cow?  Some of it is sold in Hawaii to be used in ox-tail soup.  You can't tell if the tail is male or female.  Amazingly enough, the tail bone has a lot of fat, which is good.  See right.

My enhanced poke was a masterpiece which began at Foodland, to which I added chopped cucumber, tomato, onion and kazunoko, which is herring roe, then doused with chili pepper water.  Just this concoction provides enough salt for a week.

 I watched the two top Hawaii high school football teams play, with St. Louis prevailing over Punahou.  I just saw a list in the local paper showing how many Hawaii players were on division one NCAA teams.  

Here is the list for last year.  There are 94 players.  If most of them stayed home, the University of Hawaii would be a national power.  But you can't blame them for expanding horizons.  I'd be a different person if I went to the University of Hawaii.


On Saturday, I also ordered a 15 Craigside take-out, and enhanced the hamburger by frying the patty in Japanese wagyu beef fat and buns in butter.  I added pickles, onions and cheese.  There was wide assortment of NCAA games on TV. 


Then for my second tail-gate on Saturday, my neighbor John and I had a Japanese Wagyu Beef BBQ just outside the theater for the University of Hawaii football game:


For dessert, I had a dish of macadamia nut ice cream with hot green tea and chilled sake.  John had a pecan pie.

Our seats in the front row:


Last week, Washington crushed Hawaii.  Fine with John, as he got his medical degree from there.  This week, Stanford lost, but LSU and Hawaii won.

Then on Sunday, I watched NFL football, for I have seven fantasy teams.  If you have a favorite team, of course, that would be your choice.  Me?  I turn to NFL Red Zone, a FREE channel (if you subscribe to the sports package) which starts when the games begin, and ends when the later afternoon games conclude.  NO commercials.  

Most exciting game of the day?  Rookie Daniel Jones from Duke made his first start at quarterback in place of the venerable Eli Manning (two-time Super Bowl MVP) for the New York Giants.  At the end, with a bit more than a minute left, he ran for a touchdown on fourth down.  Extra point.  Giants 32 - Buccaneers 31.  Game won?  Nope, Tampa Bay came back with little time remaining for a chip shot field goal, where their rookie kicker had already made three straight.  He missed, barely.  Giants win!  Giants win!  I have Saquon Barkley of the Giants on one of my fantasy teams.  He got injured.  He'll be out for weeks.  You win some.  Lose some.  Fantasy sports make the watching all that more meaningful.

 The immediate above was after I had a modest Japanese Wagyu Beef sandwich with beer and leftover wine from Saturday night, a Stanford Cardinal Rule Cabernet Sauvignon:

This morning as I compose this blog, my anthurium patch and first water lily of the season:

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In the Indian Ocean, Typhoon Hikaa is now a Category 2, but should slightly weaken before making landfall over Oman late Tuesday night.

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วันอาทิตย์ที่ 22 กันยายน พ.ศ. 2562

THE BEST OF BAROQUE

Sunday is a time for solemn music.  What better than Baroque, one of my very favorite genres.

Here is a top ten by liveaboutcom, where #4 from above is #1 and #1 from above is #6.

The Baroque period ranged from 1600 to 1750, preceded by the Renaissance (1400-1600) and followed by the Classical (1730-1820) periods.  The Romantic era extended from 1780 to 1910, with Modernists dominating from 1890 to 1950.

Sure, we have rock and rap, but "classical" music continues today:  postmodern/contemporary from 1930 and minimalist from 1965.  Baroque music was designed for listening, and concerts were typically a basso continuo group of harpsichordists and lute players, with string instruments.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau perhaps best explains the sounds:  Baroque music is that in which the harmony is confused, and loaded with modulations and dissonances. The singing is harsh and unnatural, the intonation difficult, and the movement limited. It appears that term comes from the word 'baroco' used by logicians.

A particular Baroque treasure is Johann Pachelbel's Canon in D.  Written more than 3 centuries ago, it was mostly forgotten, and again made popular in 1968 by Jean-Francois Paillard, leading to a re-showcase in the 1980 Ordinary People, then used by Carl Sagan in his Cosmos series, this version played by James Galway in 2000.  Go to a wedding or funeral, and you'll hear it again and again.

I've long wondered why Baroque, of all the genres, joined my list of favorites.  Perhaps this started for me with Canon in D.  Something to do with quiet and enchanting patterns with discordant moments.  Then again, like most of what is preached on Sundays, perhaps I'll never figure out the origin or truth.

Baroque came to rival my other top music genres on 19 October 2015 in Venice.  On this day, I met my Blue-Bar Pigeon, had possibly my best lunch ever at Quadri with St. Mark's Square as my view, featuring six wines and five courses of white truffles, then got the last seat in a theater where the San Marco Chamber Orchestra performed Antonio Vivaldi's Four Seasons.  He grew up in Venice and put together much of this composition here, close to where I was sitting.

PBS's Great Performances just this past week featured Scott Yoo traveling through Northern Italy, especially Venice, focusing on the life and works of Vivaldi.  Click here to watch the full 53 minute performance (without any fund-raising segments). A truly wonderful program.

For completeness, here are all the prominent Baroque composers:
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No serious ocean storms, although the Atlantic is messy:
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