Lift Up Your Hearts!

Our Academy Award "Best Picture" quest is getting squirrelier as we move into more modern times.  (Okay, so the 70s isn't exactly modern, I know.)  We were married but without kids when The Deer Hunter came out, and so might have actually seen it in the theater, but we didn't.  Now I know why.  We did see One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest during that time, and I was haunted and depressed for weeks.  I'm a little more hardened now, I guess, or better at thinking of other things, or, more likely, too busy to be able to afford giving it much thought, but this one would have had the same effect.  I guess I can understand why someone would make a depressing move, but why anyone would want to watch one is beyond me.  It's not that there weren't some redeeming features about it—but not enough to induce me to see it again, or recommend it.

The director did state that he wasn't particularly interested in historical accuracy—to me a fatal flaw if you're going to have a historical setting—but he could at least have gotten the mountains right.  Substituting a steel town in Ohio for one in the Pittsburgh area is one thing, and Thailand can do in a pinch for Vietnam, but using the Cascade Mountains in Washington to portray Western Pennsylvania?

I found this great site while procrastinating doing research for our Christmas letter and want to share it.  Did you ever want to know how far it really is from Orlando to Basel?  Or the path your airplane would probably take from New York to Paris?  Check out Great Circle Mapper!

The Power of Full Engagement: Managing Energy, Not Time, Is the Key to High Performance and Personal Renewal, by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz (Free Press, 2003)

I must send this book back to the library without a proper review, but it deserves a few comments.  After hearing a friend's summary, I had to find out more.  I'm afraid I was somewhat disappointed, but I think that was more because my friend's summary was so good, causing me to expect more than was there.  I almost, though not quite, would have been as well off with just the summary.  I also might have appreciated it more if I had not already read so many books by Stephen Covey, of which this book reminds me very much.  I think Covey's books are well worthwhile, and this too, but there wasn't as much new as I had expected.

After that buildup, I'm sure you're expecting me to reproduce what my friend said.  Alas, I can't do that, but I will try to cover a couple of points that were especially meaningful to me.

First—and this is a point that needs much more exploring than I can do here—is the power of positive rituals in our lives.  The authors studied top-notch tennis players to try to find what separated the greatest from the great.  Their conclusion was that they were equally skilled at the game; the difference was in how they used the brief moment when they were not actively playing. The really great players, for example, had specific rituals that they went through between points.  What that did for them, the authors discovered, was enable them to rest and recover more than their non-ritualistic opponents.  Both had the same amount of time, but somehow the ritual enabled the greater player to get into recovery mode much more quickly; thus he recovered more fully.  All this in a few seconds between points, but it made a huge difference.

That idea got me thinking about the importance of ritual in general, in a way I hadn't considered before.  I've often felt that the increasing loss of ritual and routine in our casual and hurried society is not good, that we suffer for the loss of regular bedtimes and predictable bedtime procedures, consistent family meals, gestures of respect, holiday customs, liturgy in worship, and so much more.  Now my eyes have been opened to a possible reason for my gut feeling.

Flexibility is important too, but ritual is a kind of lubricant that makes life work better, and more efficiently.  Automating parts of our lives frees energy for more important work.  Certain decisions, once made, can be rested upon and not revisited every night, or every year.  Perhaps rituals work like the "muscle memory" of a musician, in which the muscle is so well trained that it works independently of the brain, and thus much faster than if the movement required conscious thought.

I haven't thought it all through yet, but it's definitely an idea worth pursuing.

The second powerfu idea in The Power of Full Engagement is that we are not only overstressed, we are also understressed.  High performance requires balance in our lives among the physical, mental, emotional, and spiritual dimensions.  For each we have "muscles," either literal or metaphoric, and with that analogy it's easy to see the harm in both overuse and underuse.  Most of us, the authors found, can reduce stress in some areas by stressing others a little more.  For example, people in high-stress jobs tend to neglect themselves physically, which leads to a downward spiral.  Even though they feel they can't possibly make time for exercise or good nutrition, when they do, they find they improve their lives in all areas.  We speak much about the need to reduce stress in our lives, but paradoxically that may be best achieved by increasing stress in neglected areas.

I'll close with a quote that doesn't fit with either of the above thoughts, but which I love and want to record.

Extrinsic rewards have actually been shown to undermine intrinsic motivation.  Researchers Mark R. Lepper and David R. Green spent time watching nursery school children at play in order to assess what they most enjoyed doing.  Next, they began giving each child a reward each time he or she engaged in the preferred activity.  [I'm fairly certain this is a reference to the work of the University of Rochester's Edward Deci and Richard Ryan.]  Across the board, the children's interest in activiies quickly diminished when they were associated with rewards.  In a second study, adults doing puzzles were rewarded each time they were successful in completing them.  Like the children, their interest in continuing the activity progressively decreased.  Plainly, people can be motivated by material gain and by external praise.  The point is that we feel more passion for and derive more pleasure from doing what we freely choose and most enjoy.

We watched Bridge to Terebithia yesterday, and I've been struggling with what to say about it ever since.  As usual, Porter knew exactly what he liked and didn't like, and had no trouble expressing himself on the issues.  Often I can, too; in fact, I did so easily with the other movie we watched this weekend, the Oscar-winning The Apartment.  (In brief, it started off slowly and the story was unpleasant, but Shirley MacLaine's acting was amazing and powerful.)

I should have known Bridge to Terebithia would be harder to critique, because Porter's commentary—during and immediately after—which I usually find informative and interesting, was more annoying than not.  That happens when I have been very much drawn into a movie, and anything that calls me back prematurely is jarring, rather like being jerked out of a deep meditation by the telephone.  Whenever I am thus entranced by a movie, I know rational analysis will be difficult.

Porter didn't like the movie, and I did.  He could be specific, such as his comment that the transitions between real life and the fantasy world did not work for him—unlike his experience with The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe.  But while I could find things to complain of—I didn't like the music; there were some modern attitudes and stereotypes that annoyed me; there was one event the improbability of which was a distraction, even in a movie where reality and fantasy are intertwined—yet in everything that was important I could say little more than, "I liked the story."  Porter's repeated attempts to get something comprehensible out of that statement only frustrated us both.

So the question kept returning—as I was falling asleep, when I awoke, during church, through much of a lovely afternoon picnic—and I think I finally have an answer.  I deliberately avoided reading other people's reviews, though I think I will enjoy them now.  Bear in mind, also, that I have not yet read the book, but am basing my analysis solely on the film.

Film, books, music, and paintings can inspire me in a variety of ways, but the ones that mean the most to me are those of which the attraction I find hardest to explain, because they reach something within me that is beyond rationality.  They touch my imagination as well as my mind, and the imagination will not be explained, only known; if communicated, it can only be to someone whose imagination has been similarly affected.  I've tried to explain this before by saying that my favorite books and movies are those that make me want to be a better person, though that is only touching the hem of the garment, so to speak.

In thinking this through, I realized that this, precisely, is what I like about the Bridge to Terebithia story.  Despite what I had read in previews, despite what I heard in the DVD's "special features" analysis before we turned it off in disgust, this is not this story of a couple of schoolchildren who create a fantasy world as an escape from their real-life troubles.  In Bridge to Terebithia the fantasy world is far more real than everyday life.  The imagination sees truths hidden from ordinary eyes.

It wasn't till well into my ruminations that I realized that the unreality of the film's "real life" setting and characters was deliberate.  The exaggerations and stereotypes are jarring, like a painting with garish, unreal colors, which effectively highlights the question of where reality lies. 

Imagination without reason is lost, reason without imagination is dead.  Bridge to Terebithia expresses that much better than any words I could ever say about it.

Organizing for Your Brain Type by Lanna Nakone (St. Martin's Press, 2005)

Heather reviewed this book, and generated quite a discussion, some of which was actually related to the topic.  I started adding my reflections as i read it, but have decided it's best not to clutter up her post anymore and have started a new post here.  Below are a few of my reactions copied from her post; I'll add more in the comments to this post as I continue through the book.

1.  The library finally came through with this book, and I've just started reading it. I'm interested to see where it will go, because I've already been surprised by the quiz. I was sure I'd be a cross between the Harmonizer and the Innovator, but my highest score was Maintainer! Actually, I didn't score high enough in any category to fit well: 15, 11, 14, 10 [Maintainer, Harmonizer, Innovator, Prioritizer] -- and you have to have at least 20 in one category to fit that label. Just like me to defy labels, I guess. Maybe I'll get more insight as I read further.

2.  I just took the sensory preference quiz: Kinesthetic=11, Auditory=9, Visual=4. I'm not too surprised, but wish I could take the more official test you (Heather) took in school, because I know the situation is much more complex than the book's quiz can show. As low as Visual is in some areas -- powers of observation, for example -- I'd much, much rather get information from a book than a lecture, and in some ways (albeit weakly) my memory is photographic -- I'll remember the location on a page spread of a quotation I'm looking, for example. Yet if I've talked with someone for two hours and you later ask me what color dress she was wearing, I'll likely not have a clue....

3.  Although I know Dad [Porter] isn't 100% Maintainer, here's evidence that that Force is strong in him:

With your linear, structured style, you focus on details and develop effective methods that allow you to manage tasks and complete assignments, checking them off one by one. Your work style isn't about speed, but reflects a methodical approach that usually requires uninterrupted time to get the job done. Being slow-paced, deliberate, and sequential, your brain type prefers doing things in a way that can appear to others as somewhat boring. But who cares, you do it right the first time and would rather take the time to be right than [be] the first one done!

One of my first memories of Dad is that his programming style was painful (to me) but his programs always worked the first time! (I was much more of an iterative programmer - try this, make a change, try that, make a change, etc. as I homed in on the solution.)

Because I'm usually the last to see a film (this one is from 1989), I won't worry about spoilers, but if you haven't seen it, be warned that this post will reveal both too little and too much of the story.

The movie had been recommended by several people, so when I found it on Netflix I put it in the queue, and last week it worked its way to the top.  I found it an engaging and moving film, but it wasn't until the next day that I realized why it troubled me.

That mindless conformity can be stultifying, especially in a school setting, I heartily agree.  Robin Williams is convincing as the new English teacher, Mr. Keating, whose oddball antics at an elite prep school finally begin to teach his students to think more independently.  It's hard not to cheer at the end, when after giving in to pressure from their parents and the school administration to accuse Mr. Keating of misconduct and get him fired, they turn around and give him a modest show of support that indicates his work was not all in vain.  But this visceral response does not stand up to rational analysis.

C. S. Lewis said (somewhere) that each age and culture works assiduously to stamp out the sins to which it has the least tempation while being blind to its own particular weaknesses.  Dead Poets Society is like that.  Urging most teenagers to rebel against their parents and other adult authorities is like urging a fish to swim.  Had the focus of the movie been on peer conformity it might have been more useful, though not as well-received.

As winsome as Mr. Keating is, and as much as I approve of some of his ideas and see the value of his methods, there's no getting around the reality that he turned a lion loose and learned too late he could not control it.  He did not give his students the education their parents were paying for, and encouraged them in actions that were contrary to their parents' wishes.  As easy as it is to hate the one-dimensional, villainous parents as they are presented here, it shouldn't have required forced confessions to fire Keating—he wasn't doing the job he had been hired to do.

Coercion from parents and school administrators is portrayed as bad, but pressure from fellow students as good.

And the most-quoted line from the film, carpe diem?  Do we really want to tell young people to "seize the day"?  Seeing the present merely as preparation for the future is a fault, to be sure, but it's not one to which young people are especially prone.

Nonetheless, throughout the movie I found myself rooting for rebellion and cheering signs of independence in the students, despite the fact that it showed itself in actions I would normally call wrong.  Now that's scary, and shows the power of a moving story.

By the way, lest any of you decide to see the movie for yourselves, I disagree with its PG rating.  PG-13 maybe.  A suicide, a magazine picture of a naked woman, drunkenness, smoking, a wild party, some language I would rather not hear.  Not terrible, but I wouldn't call it PG.

Mommy, It's a Renoir! was the title of a book about art appreciation for children that I fell in love with many years ago.  To my chagrin, by the time I decided we could afford to buy the set, it was no longer available.

Thus I was thrilled to discover that the program is back in print.  Once a homeschooler, always a homeschooler, especially when one has nephews and grandchildren to consider.  For reasons I can't imagine, the exciting title has been changed to How to Use Child-Size Masterpieces.  Could they have tried to make it sound more boring?

It is the same book, however, and the "Child-Size Masterpieces" booklets that provide materials for the program are also available, from Parent Child Press.  Perhaps I find it easier to spend money for grandchildren than children; perhaps I fear they will go out of print again; perhaps I'm looking forward to learning more about art myself as I try it out.  Mostly likely all three.  In any case, I ordered the whole set!

I also ordered the DVD that explains how to use the program.  (The website says it's a videotape, but it's actually a DVD and less expensive than the tape.)  The information on the DVD is covered better in the book, so I can't recommend spending the additional $20; on the other hand, it is helpful to see the program in use, so I can recommend watching the DVD once, if you <ahem> happen to know someone who already owns it.

Another thing not to spend money on turns out to be the folders.  The program is very Montessori-like, with a specific, color-coded folder setup designed, as are most Montessori materials, to give the child as much independence as possible in his work.  I'm not saying this is a bad idea; I think it's great.  But it's probably worth making them yourself—the book includes instructions.  I chose to purchase the materials "with vinyl storage folders" for an additional cost, expecting that the work would be done for me:  cutting the folders down to size, pasting the "representative" picture on the outside, adding the color-coding dots for the pockets, gluing folders together to make the four- and six-pocket folders needed for some of the steps in the program, cutting apart the pictures and sorting them appropriately amongst the folders.  Wrong.  The folders are of the right color and dimensions, but the rest of the work remains.  We'll see what I think about my decision when I've done the work.

Those are the negatives.  For the rest, I'm excited!  Janet and I are going to enjoy working through the program ourselves before passing it on.  I hope to gain, not only a better appreciation for art, but sufficient knowledge of the program to be able to expand it ad infinitum using other art postcards.

Kingdom of Children: Culture and Controversy in the Homeschooling Movement (Princeton Studies in Cultural Sociology), by Mitchell Stevens (Princeton University Press, 2001)

I've forgotten what led me to find Kingdom of Children, but from the reviews on amazon.com I knew I had to read it.  I have been trying to explain to our own family some of the homeschooling controversies of the late 80's and early 90's, and why I emerged with prejudices against certain people and organizations they are even now encountering, such as the Home School Legal Defense Association, even though we were members, and Josh Harris—though the latter is a case of visiting the sins of the father on the son, which I realize is unfair.  If they want to understand, this book would be a good starting point.  They won't get enough information to know much of the whys and wherefors of my concerns—the author is too objective, too nice for that—but they will get a general picture of the history of the era.

As anyone who has read my other reviews will know, I frequently find the beginnings of books frustrating but by the end find they have redeemed themselves—or at least I've found something of value worth keeping, even if it's not the main thrust of the book.  Kingdom of Children is in many ways the opposite.  As Stevens was setting the historical background, I was impressed with his research and his objective understanding of the complexities of the homeschooling world in those days.  If he had stopped there, I would have recommended the book unreservedly.  But Stevens is not a historian, he's a sociologist, and I found the sociological aspects of the book boring and even ludicrous in places.

His idea that homeschooling of all forms represents a peculiar emphasis on the importance of individual souls (rather than the collective "society," I assume) is a bit frightening, and his view that it requires an enormous sacrifice betrays a complete lack of understanding of the most important part of the movement—and of parenting in general.  The author seems truly mystified as to why families would sacrifice extra income, and women their "careers," to be at home rearing their children at all, much less for the many years required by homeschooling.  He talks about the modern emphasis on "self," and extends that to increased parental emphasis on the importance of tuning a child's education to his individual needs, rather than accepting a collective approach to education.  He views the renewed emphasis among some people on the importance of homemaking and childrearing as women's desperate attempts to console themselves for the loss of their careers and "liberation."

In other words, he has no clue. 

On the one hand, I was happy to read through his history and recognize the issues and debates that troubled us in those years, especially the HR6 controversy.  I could recognize myself and others; I knew most of the names and movements.  As I had hoped, he explains the issues and sequences of events better than I could.  I was disappointed, however, to see that he has missed a large segment of the picture.

I suppose it is natural for a sociologist to view people through the lens of the groups with which they align themselves.  I was happy to see that he recognizes considerable overlap between the two major branches of homeschooling in those days, which he calls "the inclusives" and "the believers."  What he fails to appreciate, however, is the many homeschoolers who were not "joiners," but preferred to take ideas from all factions and craft their own way without finding it necessary to give allegiance to a particular view or organization.  He does make it abundantly clear that this is not the road to political power, and I'm not downplaying the significance of politics and power in our lives.  As Pericles said, "Just because you do not take an interest in politics doesn't mean politics won't take an interest in you."  However, I have deep suspicians that politcal power usually comes at the expense of family power, and equally that family power is the more important of the two. 

And that's a distinction that transcends any particular educational choice.

I need Porter.

I'm not in this case referring to the fact that he has a good job and my employable skills are a quarter century out of date.

Nor to the fact that when I say I'd be lost without him, I mean that literally.  Oh, I can navigate pretty well and even find my car in the parking lot if I put my mind to it.  The trouble is, my mind is usually elsewhere entirely.

Nor because it's wonderful to have someone around who can work on the roof without getting all faint-hearted and weak-kneed.

I'm not even talking about emotional support; the security of knowing someone cares if I'm late coming home; arms to comfort and a shoulder to cry on; tender words of respect and encouragement; a friendly presence in the house, and on the other side of the bed.

Not even love.

I love him for all of these, but what I really need Porter for his efforts to pull me out of my ruts.  In a grumpier mood I call these distractions.

Inspired by my daughter's mother-in-law (there must be a better way to say that), I'm making a list of things I want to do before I die.  This is an interesting exercise, though like most forms of exercise better started at an earlier age. But while writing the list is a new idea, I've had an unwritten, mental list for years that tends to consume my life.  "Workaholic" is not a term usually used to describe someone whose last paycheck was 27 years ago, but it's not inappropriate.  When you're over 50 and the list of what you want to do before you die keeps getting longer, a feeling of urgency is justified.

Recently, Porter attended a class that kept him out of town for two weeks.  Certainly I missed him!  But the time was not without advantages.  Figuring eight hours for sleep, and another for meals, phone calls, and miscellaneous, that left me with a 15-hour work day!

I cut my meals down to two a day, which turned out to be remarkably easy.  People talk about skipping breakfast and/or lunch, but I've never been able to do that without significant sacrifice.  I'm always hungry for breakfast and lunch.  But with no one to cook for, I learned that skipping dinner is a piece of cake.  (Figuratively speaking, of course.)  By eating a late lunch I discovered the remarkable liberation of finishing the final meal of the day and still having seven or eight hours before bedtime—what's normally considered a full work day.

Except for church on Sunday, the only time I left home was as part of my exercise routine.  It being summertime, most of my away-from-home commitments were curtailed, and best of all I did absolutely no shopping.

Fifteen hours a day of work.  I completed two major projects, made significant progress on several others, and developed and established some important personal habits.  Yet I had more energy than usual at the end of the day, not less.  It was utter bliss.

It was also a fool's paradise.  It only worked because everything else worked.  Porter's salary continued to be paid, no appliances broke down, I stayed healthy, there were no family crises to deal with, no hurricanes came our way; there were none of the events—happy or sad—in which being alone is really hard.  I'm deeply grateful.

Even in the absence of problems, however, it's not a sustainable lifestyle.  One cannot just write; one must take time out to live life and thus have something to write about.  Creating photo albums is not possible without the events that make up the photos.  (Though, frankly, my backlog is of sufficient size to take me well into old age, I fear.)  Most of all, the point of most of my projects is to share with or benefit other people in some way, so cutting myself off from those very people to work on the projects makes only short-term, occasional sense.  (Not that I was cut off during those two weeks, being blessed with e-mail, inexpensive phone service, and friends and family who make a point of keeping in contact.  Porter calls at least once, often twice a day when he is on the road, God bless him!  That's why I can spend two weeks alone without being in the least lonely.)

Enter Porter.  As far as I can tell, his primary love language is Quality Time.  He loves to do things, he loves to do things together, and he particularly loves doing things that involve going somewhere away from home.  All of which Interrupts My Work.

It also makes my work worthwhile, so I recognize it as a gift and a blessing.  There's a reason God designed us to require other people in our lives.  It doesn't have to be a husband; in fact, we really need many kinds and sorts of people.  But a spouse is definitely an asset in this context.

Which brings me to the other point of this post:  The Concert Surprise.  We're regular patrons of the Orlando Philharmonic Orchestra, but we didn't sign up for their Sounds of Summer series this year because of our irregular schedule.  When he discovered that we would actually be home for one recently, Porter wanted to go.

Sounds Of Summer II
Italia “La Più Bella”
Thursday, July 5, 2007 7:00 PM
Created by Daniel Flick

This musical feast is sure to satisfy the tastes of all Italian Music Lovers. Works of the classic Italian masters, Corelli, Tartini, Vivaldi, and Boccherini, are accompanied by Italian folk music favorites ranging in flavor from “la Sole alla Luna” or as we say in English, from “the Sun to The Moon.” These works are brought to life on traditional Italian instruments including Mandolin, Accordion, Classical Guitar, String Quartet and Soprano.

It sounded interesting, but had I been alone I would not have attended.  Too many other projects would have taken higher priority.  But I went, because anything done with Porter automatically acquires very high priority along with considerably increased interest.

Yes, it was an enjoyable concert.  But the part that was the most fun was opening up the program to discover that one of the two above-mentioned Sopranos was our friend, Ashley Locheed!  We've been enjoying Ashley's performances since she was a freshman in college, but lately her career path has taken her into venues we don't usually frequent and hours at which we'd rather be asleep, so this was a treat.

It pays to get out of the house every once in a while.

First a confession:  We have recently gone over to the Dark Side.  That is, we joined Netflix.

Despite our firm convictions that television and movies on the whole are an assault on the mind and spirit, as well as a waste of time, we are not total Luddites and appreciate that the video medium has its good purposes.  One of which might occasionally be simply relaxing with one's family.  :)

That last purpose was getting harder and harder to accomplish, since our local video stores have moved to concentrating on the latest movies, "kiddie shows," and video games.  It's next to impossible to find good mysteries, old movies, or anything educational.  Enter Netflix.  I'm all for supporting local businesses (or even mega-businesses with a local presence), but if they won't stock anything worth renting, I'll seek out a business that does.

Which brings me to the subject of this post.  At one point—it must be a few years ago now—we discovered the TV show, Numb3rs.  I was immediately entranced and could have become {gasp} hooked on a weekly TV show, except that its 10 p.m. slot meant not getting to sleep until after 11, and no show is worth that on a regular basis.

But then we joined Netflix.  Now we have seen the entire first season of Numb3rs, and a third of the second, spread out over about three months.  I probably should wait till I've caught up with today before writing, but I won't, because right now my review is positive, and I'm always afraid the show will degenerate as so many have done.  For the same reason, I've so far avoided websites that discuss the show.  I hope I'm wrong—but the few episodes we've seen of the current season don't make me too optimistic.  Nonetheless—

(First, a very quick synopsis for those who aren't familiar with the show.  Charlie and Don Eppes are brothers.  Don is an FBI agent; Charlie is a math genius, former child prodigy, now math professor at the fictional Cal Sci—clearly modeled after Cal Tech, whose consultants help out with the show's mathematics.  Each episode of Numb3rs features Charlie and some of his Cal Sci buddies using mathematics to help the FBI solve crimes.)

I love this show! For a number of reasons, the first of which is that, unlike almost every television show I've happened upon in the last oh-so-many years, it is relatively inoffensive.  Amazingly so.  I can't turn on network television for  10 minutes without being utterly repulsed, it seems.  Considering the show is about Los Angeles, criminals, and the FBI, one could call the language unrealistic.  This is a good thing.  If I wanted to hear that kind of language, I could return to vounteering at the local high school.  As it is, I wasn't bothered, though there are still some phrases I'd rather not hear my grandchildren repeating.  It's not a show suitable for them for other reasons, anyway.

Although their are occasional sexual crimes on the show, they are dealt with reasonably.  As far as the main characters go, sexual references are there, but few and far between.  One character is revealed as having lived with someone (outside of marriage) in the past, and another briefly mentions a sexual experience, but other than that we are spared those details (so far).  In the last episode (of the first season), the FBI catches a criminal in bed with his girlfriend, but even that wasn't too bad.  This may not sound restrained, but let me assure those of you who haven't peeped in on the recent TV/movie scene, this is a major step in the right direction for Hollywood!

If a show is about crime, there will be violence, but this, too, is understated.  (The pilot is the worst of what we've seen so far, and it's still better than most crime shows.)

That's what the show is not, and I go into all that detail first because there are those reading here who would really enjoy Numb3rs who don't like unpleasant surprises.

But what makes Numb3rs such a good show?  After all, if all you want to do is avoid bad language, sexual references, and violence, you don't have to watch any show at all.

Well, for one thing, it's not just about crime; it's about family.  Charlie, Don, and their dad live together in a pleasant home.  (Don and Charlie's mother died of cancer before the first episode, which provides some poignant moments. )  Actually, Don has his own apartment, but spends a lot of time back home.  They eat together, talk together, and play games together.  (Are you beginning to see a little resemblance here to my own family?)  The father is kindly, intelligent, and wise—characteristics not often associated with fathers by today's writers.  The brothers have their issues and occasional squabbles, but they clearly love, respect, and care for one another.

But most of all, I love Numb3rs because I can relate to it.  I watch the interactions amongst the various Cal Sci professors and students and want to shout, "I know these people!"  One of the reasons I find television shows and movies boring for the most part is that they are so totally unreal, and don't intersect my world in any way.  Numb3rs is different.

When Charlie tries to explain to Don that he can't just make his brain work on anything he wants to, that he must work on the problem that his brain is pursuing at the moment, I know exactly what he means.  I'm no math genius, and I know that discipline can be bridle and bit to the mind, but I also know how much more effective and efficient I am when I can give my brain its head, so to speak, and let it run with whatever is inspiring it at the moment of inspiration and for however long the course lasts.

When he groans at interruptions I know the frustration of having to start a whole line of thinking again because it has been broken, and of losing the tenuous idea altogether.  I don't identify with his doing math while listening to blaring rock music on his headphones—but he's younger than me.  :)

I love to hear the conversations between Charlie and his friend Larry, the physicist, because they sound like people I know, and sometimes even conversations I have had.  I even get some of the jokes.  They talk about things that matter in my world.

In other words, for all its obviously fictional qualities, I find Numb3rs believable—real people, real families, real work.  That's more than I can say about the rest of Hollywood's output, even (or especially) so-called realistic drama and "reality" shows.

Not that television shows matter, really.  There are better things to do with the time.  But the human nature is such that one cannot help delighting in the feeling that someone, somewhere, understands.  Even if only a little, and even if it is a made-up TV show.

Not that it's without some common Hollywood faults.  The female main characters are all drop-dead gorgeous as well as supremely competent, and the men aren't so bad, either.  Not much reality there.  Worse, the writers, producers, directors, and actors can't seem to shake basic Hollywood assumptions any more than a fish can shake his aquatic environment.  It's easy to catch the standard liberal digs thrown in, such as the U. S. government training terrorists in Colombia, and the stupidty of the Department of Homeland Security.  Worse, although as I said the sexual subplots are (or have been so far) mimimal, there is a basic assumption that any romantic relationship naturally leads to sex and moving in together, sans marriage, of course.  It seems Hollywood finds esoteric mathematicians easier to understand than those they refer to as "red state people."

You learn a lot from the extra features on the DVD about the attitudes of the actors and directors, not all of it good.  I was pleased to learn one thing about David Krumholtz, who portrays Charlie, however:  As a young student he had to take Algebra I three times, having failed twice.  But he became interested in the math his character was doing, and attended lectures and classes to try to understand it better.  At first they needed a "hand double"—someone else to write the equations on the board—but after a while he could do his own writing.

This review has sat around for over a month waiting to be better organized, so I'm calling blogger's privilege and just publishing it as it is.  Bottom line:  Numb3rs is a crime show, with themes that I would not want to have to explain to a young person.  But with that caveat, I highly recommend it.  Especially on DVD, with commercials removed.  it's amazing how much better a story flows when it's not constantly interrupted.

UPDATE April 3, 2008  We've just finished Season Two.  I still enjoy the shows, although the season ender was weird as well as offensive and if Season 3 is consistently like that we may not make it through them all.  The show is definitely formulaic, but I like the formula, so that's not the problem.  I actually prefered it when they stuck to the math and didn't delve so much into the characters' private lives.  Well, some of that was okay—I particularly like the warm-and-fuzzy family scenes—but Hollywood's basic assumptions regarding sexual behavior ruins the romantic-interest angle for me.  Numb3rs has definitly upped the ante on the sex-violence-bad language, though it is still better than most.  Sad that they can't leave one show that's adult without being offensive!

As I mentioned earlier, it's the basic Hollywood worldview that provides most of the offense.  The last show of the second season found nothing unreasonable about dream-visitation of the living by the dead, but the presence of a Bible in someone's home noteworthy and suspicious, and a character's statement that he and his girlfriend did not believe in having sex without marriage to be so peculiar as to make him into the chief suspect.

Larry the physicist is still my favorite character, though, and it's almost worth watching just for him.  On to Season Three! 

UPDATE May 27, 2008  Season Three is done, and I'm more than a little frustrated that Season 4 is not yet available.  The last episode of Season Three had some interesting twists but even more holes and logical inconsistencies that would be fun to discuss—if I could find the one other person in the world who has watched up to the end of Season Three but none of Season Four.  I won't talk about them here for fear of doing to someone else what Netflix did to me:  Whoever wrote the synopsis for the Season Four DVDs included a serious spoiler for the previous season.  Not cool.

All that aside, what I wrote in the April 3 update still holds.  The Hollywood worldview continues to intrude.  The sex-language-violence is to the point where I can tolerate it for the sake of the whole story, but can no longer recommend the series without serious caveats.  I'd say it's about to the level of the early James Bond movies.  But the basic premise of the show is still delightful, most of the stories are interesting, and there's a decent amount of character development that makes the whole team—not just Larry anymore—likeable.

On the whole Season Three was better than the last episode of Season Two.  It's a shame the writers think they have to do something bizarre in the season-ender.

Round Ireland with a Fridge, by Tony Hawks (St. Martin's Press, New York, 2000)

This is Janet's book, given to her by a friend when she graduated from college.  I try to treat other people's books with greater respect than I do my own—and that's saying a lot.  Nevertheless, I must confess the damage done to Round Ireland with a Fridge when I spewed a fresh mouthful of iced tea all over one of its pages.  It's the kind of book where one loses control of the laugh reflex.

In 247 pages, Tony Hawks amply demonstrates both the dangers of excessive alcohol consumption and the truth of Don Aslett's assertion that those who make their paths and projects public are likely to find an abundance of help coming their way.  Awakening one morning after a night of partying, he found a note by the side of his bed:  "I hereby bet Tony Hawks the sum of One Hundred Pounds that he cannot hitch-hike around the circumference of Ireland, with a fridge, within one calendar month."  Although his friend graciously offered to release him from the bet, Tony took it on as a challenge.

Tony won the bet, though it didn't even cover the cost of the fridge he bought to take with him.  In the process he saw Ireland as no tourist ever has, and discovered that it is actually easier to hitch-hike with a kitchen appliance than without one.

It's not a profound book, and certainly not a perfect one.  There are few sexual references and some language I don't care to hear, as well as a whole lot of drinking—but it's far too funny to be offensive.

I believe Janet lent me this book before she went to Japan, which means the reading process took me me more than 20 times as long as it took Tony to make his circuit of Ireland.  Once begun, however, Round Ireland with a Fridge is actually a fast read and a fun one.

Porter laughed through it too, so you can have your book back now, Janet.  Complete with tea stains.

If I'd known how big a project book cataloguing would be, I'm not sure I would have had the courage to start, but now that it's done, I'm quite pleased with it.  There's a link to it here, and on the sidebar, and on the Sursum Corda home page.  I'm not yet ready to leave it open to any and all web crawlers, so there's a small amount of security associated with it.  Family members can get in the same way you access the Family News page.  If you're a friend who happens to want to browse in this library, please e-mail me, and I'll be happy to open the door to you.

C. S. Lewis once quipped that the only books we will have in heaven will be ones we gave away or lent on earth. This is a lending library; if you see something you'd like to read that's not in your own public library, please ask!

The effort ended up taking over a month of pretty steady, hard work.  I made much of that for myself, I'll admit.  If I had been content with the content the software downloaded from the Internet, it would have gone much faster.  But I wanted the information to be correct and reasonably complete, though even so I ignored many of the less important data fields, such as cover price.  Even more time-consuming, I insisted on having a cover photo for each book, which required a lot of scanning, because most of our books are too old to have their cover photos online.  No, it's not necessary, but it looks nice!  I know how much I appreciate being able to browse books visually, as well as by title, so I'm assuming others do, too.

The last room to be done was my office; I had saved the hardest for last.  On the one hand, there are more modern books here, so I could use the barcode scanner more effectively.  On the other hand, there are more old books, too—just plain more books!  I offer some statistics below for your amusement.  They are only approximate, because sometimes I let one entry do for an entire series of books, but they're interesting nonetheless.

• Total number of books: about 1800


• Number of books in my office: nearly 900


• Top 10 authors: George MacDonald (77), C. S. Lewis (49), Patrick O'Brian (22), Charles Schultz (22), Dorothy Sayers (21), Arthur Ransome (19), Miss Read (Dora Jessie Saint) (18), Robert Athearn (16 - all in one set of American history books), John Montroll (15), Isaac Asimov (14)


• No, we haven't read all the books.  Some, like cookbooks, aren't meant to be read through.  Many, many others came our way when my father moved from his big house, and I mean to get to them, someday...

Why did I do this?  The most important reason is that a book isn't of any use if it stays on a shelf.  There's no point in having a book if you don't read it (or at least plan to), and you can't read it if you can't find it.

Moreover, we have a great treasure here, and would like others to be able to share our bounty.  That's why the list is online—so others can browse and borrow.  The Book Collector software comes with the ability to keep track of books lent out, which has heretofore been a problem for me.

Some people might recognize books of theirs that made their way into our collection, and say, "Aha!  So that's where my book is!"  Stranger things have happened.  I once lent two books to Person A, and never got them back.  I told you (see above) I have a problem with keeping track of what I've lent to whom. By the time I got around to asking, it was so much later Person A had no idea where the books were, so I wrote them off.  Not without some sorrow, but I try not to lend any books I wouldn't be willing to give away, if needed—for just such occasions.  Much later, a dear friend, Person B, died, and I was one of the people who helped sort through her books.  Lo and behold, there were my two missing books!  I knew they were mine because of the inscriptions, and of course I was given them back.  But no one could at that point explain how they had ended up where they did, and it's still a mystery.  Okay, I will give in to a trifling vanity and reveal Person A, because it's amusing to be able to say I lent books to R.C. Sproul.  I also once gave a dime to a Rockefeller who needed change for a pay phone. :)

With a nod to hurricane season, which began in the middle of my efforts, all this documentation should help if we ever need to file an insurance claim.  Not that any of our books are worth much, in an insurance-company sense, but if they express disbelief that we really had 1800 books, I can reply, "Yes, sir, we did—I counted them."  Not that I want to lose a one of them, after all this work

And finally, when the time comes, if our heirs want to fight over who gets what book, they can do it much more conveniently this way.  :)

Having written recently about my love of student recitals, I have to mention that we went to a Florida Symphony Youth Orchestra concert yesterday.  In my limited, and admittedly biased opinion, they are far and away the best student orchestra in the area.  Not perfect:  Depending on whose philosophy happens to be strongest at the time, the emphasis is sometimes more on education than on making music. As most of you know, I strongly believe that real learning more often takes place in an atmosphere of "let's do something wonderful and important together" than in a "Me Teacher, You Student" situation.

Be that as it may, the FSYO is the best game in town for a young person who wants to play good orchestral repertoire, and it's good listening, too. The only reason we don't attend more of their concerts is that there are so many other great things to do in life.

But we went yesterday, because it was the last concert of the season, and we hadn't been to one yet this year.  More than that, we went because the concert included three commissioned pieces, one of which (Mountain Air and Dance) was written by our friend John Dupuis.  Unfortunately, John's composition was for the Prelude Orchestra (third from the top of the four orchestras, one above the strings-only group of beginnners), which for various complicated reasons had not had enough time to practice it.  It was a bit of a stretch for them.  Still, there was a gorgeous melody in the middle, and in the rest I could detect an interesting piece that reminded me of why I fell in love with John's Atlantis many years ago.  (Atlantis, which was written with a particular group of FSYO musicians in mind, was recorded by the Seattle Symphony Orchestra and used by Universal Studios for the grand opening of their Islands of Adventure theme park.)

The Prelude Orchestra was interesting to hear.  (They did much better with their other pieces).  My experience with student orchestras has been that the winds are, as a section, better than the strings.  For one thing, the competition is more fierce (fewer positions); for another, good orchestral music tends to have very hard string parts.  But this time the situation was reversed, probably because the strings had a few really good players, and in the winds there's no place for a less confident player to hide.  Playing tentatively is a major mistake for an oboe or a trumpet, and these kids haven't yet learned to "sin boldly."  There was a lovely oboe solo in Edelweiss, however.  (Hmm, I did manage to work a flower into this post after all.)

The Philharmonia Orchestra's commissioned piece (Stephen Foster Song-Suite) was by Joe Kreines.  He may be world famous, but "Mr. Kreines" will always be remembered in our family as the person who came in occasionally to enliven band practice, and who could get more out of an ensemble that any other conductor.  He still can, as today's concert proved.

We don't know the composer of the Symphonic Orchestra's new work (Sojourn), Robert J. Brownlow, but I suppose two out of three is pretty good!  His work matched the ability of the orchestra best of all, I think.  The Symphonic Orchestra itself has been better.  Don't get me wrong—it was still very good, just not up to the standards of a few years ago, when it was absolutely stunning.

Not that I'm prejudiced in this matter or anything—but not one of the orchestras had a decent A to tune to.  I'm a bit particular when in comes to oboes.  Their solos were fine; it was just the A's.  A 440, 460, 415...whatever!

Being involved with student musical groups for so many years, it was impossible for us not to notice the frequent coorespondence between musical and general academic ability, today's Frazz comic—in which Caulfield asserts that we need arts education so the bottom half of the math class can do something for a living—to the contrary.  This year's FSYO graduates are no exception.  Take the assistant principal cellist of the Symphonic, for example.  Valdictorian of his high school, going off to Harvard to major in biochemical sciences, and scored a perfect 2400 on the SAT (on his first try, even).  Hmm, only assistant principal cellist?  The slacker!  Oh, wait, the principal is taking her cello to the Eastman School of Music next year, so I guess the competition was a bit stiff.  She, by the way, is graduating with a mere 4.7 weighted GPA....  C'mon folks, invest a little time and money (okay, maybe a lot of time and money) in your children's musical education.  It'll be great for their brains!

All in all, the concert was a delightful way to spend a Sunday afternoon, and we even ran into some friends we hadn't seen in ages. 

We had so much fun last year at the Mad Cow Theatre's Orlando Cabaret Festival:  It Was a Very Good Year that it wasn't hard to decide to return.  As we had last year, we gilded the lily by eating dinner at the nearby Napasorn Thai restaurant, although this time we saved a whole lot of money by dining there without buying the parking/show/dinner package.  We lost out on parking, though.  There was some big bash going on downtown, which meant we paid a flat "event parking" fee of $5 instead of 50 cents/hour it should have been.  Ah, well.  Last time we parked in Boston it cost some $32, so I guess I shouldn't complain.

Whereas last year we chose the earliest possible date (1925), this year we picked the latest:  1949.  This time I recognized 15 out of the 19 songs, some of which I hadn't heard in many years, so it was quite natsukashii.

• Music Music Music (Weiss/Baum)
• A You're Adorable (Kaye, Wise & Lippman)
• Let's Take an Old Fashioned Walk (Berlin)
• Mona Lisa (Evans/Livingston)
• I've Got My Love to Keep Me Warm (Berlin)
• Here's that Rainy Day (Burke/Van Heusen)
• That Lucky Old Son (Cillespie/Smith)
• Lavender Blue (Traditional)
• I Can Dream Can't I? (Fain/Kahal)
• Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor (Berlin)
• Peter Cottontail (Burke & Haggart)
• Rudolph (Marks)
• Ghost Riders (Jones)
• Jackie Robinson (Johnson)
• I've Got a Loverly Bunch of Coconuts (Heatherton)
• It's So Nice to Have a Man Around the House  (Elliott/Spina)
• C'est Si Bon (Seelan/Hornez & Bett)
• Diamonds Are a Girls' Best Friend (Robin/Styne)
• South Pacific Medley (Hammerstein/Rodgers) 

The performance we attended was the first of four, and they had not quite got all the kinks out, but for the most part it didn't matter.  The only time it really bothered me was in the South Pacific medley.  I played in the pit orchestra for a production of South Pacific, and even though that was forty years ago (!) I heard the songs so many times I can still sing a good deal of most of them.  So when the singers messed up their lines, I knew it.  But forgotten lines don't have to detract from a performance. What was upsetting was that it was clear to us the performers, or not all of them anyway, didn't really know the show.  They were singing the songs, but not in a believable way, if you know what I mean.  Even the amateur community acting troupe I played for sang them better, though their voices were not nearly as good, because the actors were in character.  They knew whereof they sang.

A most notable exception was Stephan Jones, whom I mention by name because I was so impressed.  The way he sang Some Enchanted Evening stood head and shoulders above every other singer and every other song of the very good evening.  It was stunning, it was incredibly moving.  That's far from my favorite song from the South Pacific; it was the way Jones sang it that mattered.  He was Emile.

Here's a puzzle.  Why would they change the lyrics of There Is Nothing Like a Dame (which they sang very well by the way)? They replaced the verse below with other words that I can't remember.  Is there something offensive about them that I'm missing?

We get packages from home,
We get movies, we get shows,
We get speeches from our skipper
And advice from Tokyo Rose,
We get letters doused with perfume
We get dizzy from the smell!
What don't we get?
You know darn well!

Mysteries (and parking ripoffs) aside, It Was a Very Good Year Evening!

I like vegetables, especially if they're raw, but in many ways I have not recovered from my childhood opinion that vegetables are something you eat because they're good for you.  Occasionally I encounter a vegetable dish that erodes my prejudice, and this is one of them.  It can hardly even be called a recipe, but I share it anyway because it was so good.

We were having company for dinner on short notice, and I wanted a quick but substantial vegetable dish that would be slightly fancier than usual.  Since we were grilling chicken, I decided to use our grill wok for the veggies.  I'll admit I chose the particular items as much for color as for taste:  chunks of asparagus, onion, bell pepper, yellow summer squash, and carrot; I also went all out and included a package of "gourmet" mushrooms.  Choosing not to worry that the items would require different cooking times, I threw them all into a bowl, marinated them briefly (10-15 minutes) in olive oil (extra virgin), apple cider vinegar (unpasteurized), minced garlic, and a little sugar (to give the vegetables a nice glaze; not enough to make them sweet), and put them on the grill (in the grill wok, of course).  After that, all I did was stir them occasionally and let them cook a while (time will vary depending on quantity).

The result?  A beautiful dish with an amazing variety of colors, tastes, and textures.  If the asparagus tips were well done and the carrots barely cooked, that enhanced, rather than detracted, from the effect.  And it tasted really, really good.

I'm sure these vegetables were also really, really good for me.  But that's not why I ate them.  :)