Goodbye John Wooden

John Wooden was someone that I looked up to. I never had the privilege of being one of his players. I wasn't old enough or good enough to have played for him in college. Nor did I get the opportunity to attend one of this basketball camps, although I know many who did.

But I did have a number of regular encounters with Coach Wooden. When I was in junior high I used to see him almost daily. You see he used to jog past my bus stop each day. Upon occasion he would stop and talk to us. It was never for very long and I can't say that I really remember anything he said. In part it is because I didn't really appreciate just how special that was. But what stuck with me was the fact that this man who is considered to be a legend took the time to talk to a bunch of kids.

And in the years since I have read his books, watched some of his videos (such as the one below) and studied his Pyramid of Success. I appreciate them all because they are sensible and offer life lessons that can be applied at any time. Thank you Coach Wooden, you made a real difference.

We Live In A Bubble

Call me The Boy In The Bubble. For god only knows how long I have been ensconced in my own world. I am not talking about the dream world I escape to when I am writing Fragments of Fiction but the real world. The real world in which I occupy a thousand different roles as father, son, husband, friend, cousin and wannabe maverick.  (Thank you Sarah Palin for helping to make that word a little less fun  to use.)

Anyway, in my world the responsibilities rotate throughout the day. About ten minutes ago I was called upon to play dad and was forced to let the dark haired beauty do my hair and makeup. Her brother was none too happy watching me become beautiful so when it was done I grabbed him in a bear hug and rolled around the floor with him.

And then I retreated to the bedroom. Alone, I sit on my bed and type this post. A set of earphones are plugged in so that I can listen to the music of my choice. It helps me to concentrate and focus upon my work and tonight I have a substantial amount. I am not quite ready to begin, so this serves as a way to decompress and clear my head.

A short while ago I read Jessica Gottlieb's This Is Mommy Blogging and shook my head. It is a sad story about the death of a homeless man. A man who bled to death on a public sidewalk and died alone and uncared for. Just one more senseless death that came about because we all live in a bubble.

We live busy and important lives. I don't say that sarcastically or with any sort of snark. Everyday we scurry about and work hard to take care of the things that are important in our worlds. Parents know all about this. How many hours do mothers and fathers spend on things that are related to our childrens' welfare.

And sadly if you live in a big city it is highly likely that you have grown accustomed to the presence of homeless people all around you. You pass them on the road, outside the supermarket and all around the places you go. Sometimes you acknowledge them and grant them the gift of a friendly smile or food/money. Other times you shun them, you fear that they are mentally imbalanced and potentially dangerous so you try to stay away.

Either way it doesn't matter because the reality is that most of us have learned to walk around, step over or pass by with complete indifference. We are living in the bubble.

I like to think that I do a good job of popping the bubble for myself and for the kids. I like to think that I do a good job of opening their eyes and teaching them to value what they have. I like to think that they appreciate their good fortune and understand that we give back because it is the right thing to do.

But sometimes I wonder. Yesterday I realized that if I let my son play his DS in the car he misses the world outside the window. Sights of magic, mystery and the mundane pass by without any sort of cognition. He is already secure in the bubble that we call a Honda Odyssey, the DS just takes him further away. Am I doing him a favor by letting him play or am I helping him to tune out faster and sooner.

I wonder.

And is it fair for me to ask these questions when I am just a larger version of him. Stick me on a plane or any sort of public transportation and I take out the iPod or a newspaper. As an avowed people watcher I won't hide in the bubble the whole time, but...

Was It Good Sex or Love

This is actually an interesting story about a WWII POW who claimed to have broken out of and back into his German P.O.W. camp more than 200 times.

The reason for the frequency with which Greasley put his life in danger, he admitted with engaging good humour and frankness, was simple: he had embarked on a romance with a local German girl. Rosa Rauchbach was, if anything, running even greater risks than Greasley.
A translator at the camp where he was imprisoned, she had concealed her Jewish roots from the Nazis. Discovery of their affair would almost certainly have meant doom for them both.

Greasley recounted the almost incredible details of his wartime romance in the book Do The Birds Still Sing In Hell? (2008), which he had been "thinking about and threatening to write" for almost 70 years. But while the book is described as an "autobiographical novel", the story was largely confirmed at his debriefing by MI9 intelligence officers shortly after the war.

Read the whole story.

The People We Miss

I often complain about the holiday season. I wished death upon the Easter Bunny and Santa. Some of that is serious and some of that is nonsense.

This morning as I bounced around the blogosphere I stumbled onto a bunch of posts in which people reflected on life and some of the loved ones that they miss. It really made me think about some things that are going on now and the people that I care about because there are a few whose absence I really notice. 

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Some people play too big a role in our lives for us not to miss them. They come into our lives and they change things, or maybe things change. I am not alway quite sure how that works.

I am not talking about the obvious ones. This isn't about parents or siblings. It is understood that they play a huge role. Rather I am thinking about the unexpected impact that others can have upon you.

I am thinking about the people who enter your life and whose presence fills up empty places that you never knew or didn't realize were empty. The people who make you feel whole and joyful. Those folks whose presence just makes your body and soul tingle in ways that aren't based upon lust alone.

Sometimes you read these sorts of posts and you shake your head because you don't really believe that such a thing can happen. You think that it is an exaggeration or something else. Maybe to some it is, but others know differently.

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I have heard people talk about people coming into your life for a reason or a season, or something along those lines. I don't know if I believe that. Not sure that I believe in destiny or that I don't believe in it. What I do know is solely based upon my experience.

There are people who come into your life through unexpected means who hold a place that is significant in your heart. And since you never know what can happen you need to take advantage of that time for however long it is because you'd miss them if they were gone.

I like to visualize it all as a journey.Blame it on an overactive imagination and having read Tolkien too many times. But I almost always picture myself riding/walking through some amazing land. Sometimes it is a forest or meadow, other times it is a beach or desert.

Along the way I encounter many different people. Some are friends and some are foes. Some become companions that join me on my journey and we share adventures. Sometimes you lose those companions or sometimes you part ways for a while and rejoin each other at a later date.

Don't ask me to get more descriptive of who I see myself as. Definitely not Gandalf, Sam or Frodo. Not Boromir or Legolas or Aragorn. I am just me, some guy who finds himself in all sorts of places and predicaments. Sometimes they turn out incredibly well and others not so well.

All I know is that Some people play too big a role in our lives for us not to miss them. I know who I miss and so do they.

Who do you miss?

Amazon Eve, A Giant Model

I found this story over on The Huffington Post.

A model named Amazon Eve recently appeared in the Australian magazine Zoo Weekly. She has a beautiful face and figure, but it's her height that makes her stand out the most. According to Eve's MySpace page, the American model is 6' 8'' and 30 years old.

Scenes From A Car

I am a person who loves to watch people. Yep, that is me, a peoplewatcher. I just find it interesting to sit back and watch what people do. In restaurants I find it especially interesting to watch couples who are clearly on a date and see what happens.

Sometimes it can be a lot of fun to create dialogue for them, to offer a running commentary. OTOH, sometimes my creative juices are nonexistent and I can't think of anything funny to say.

Another aspect of peoplewatching is the fun that you can have while driving. If you spend enough time on the road you see so many different things. Here is an incomplete list of things that I have seen at one time or another:

• Woman applying makeup- Always makes me feel good to know that if they rear-end me they will end up with the mascara brush in the eye or pushed so far up their left nostril it is likely to become a permanent fixture.
• Men Shaving- Actually I once saw a guy using a blade and no shaving cream. Ouch! What are you thinking.
• The ubiquitous nosepicker- Both men and women. You may be alone in your car but you are most definitely not alone on the road.
• The ubiquitous cellphone talker- They are everywhere and there is not enough to be said about them that hasn't already been said.
• Oral Sex- Yep, I have seen more than one man with a large smile on his face and one hand on the wheel. Again this is one of those situations where I smile when I think about what will happen if the jerkoff (wrong word to use) smacks into my car.
• Fast Food Fanatic- I don't know if fanatic is the right word, but I like the alliteration. This is the guy or girl who cannot stop stuffing that leaky taco or drippy burger into their mouth.
• The Entertainer- Thus named for those people who sing and dance to the radio. It can be especially fun to watch them bebop around blissfully unaware that someone is filming them so that they can be uploaded onto the net.

Ok, this list could be more interesting and there are most definitely some screwy things that I haven't listed but this is primetime and there are children reading this blog.

A Bad Case Of Blog Envy/Jealousy

I recently received an anonymous email that accused me of having a bad case of blog envy. It seems that they think that I must be very bitter that I don't have more readers and that the brands haven't bequeathed their bounty upon me.

It was kind of fun to read. Been a while since I got anything that resembled hate mail at least something that didn't go off onto some antisemitic or anti-Israel rant. One of my favorites was the email that went on about Palin the Prophet. I responded to them that they mean to write Profit, but I never did hear back from them. Darn.

Anyway, back to my new friend the anonymous emailer. In my younger years I would have shared your email with all 17 of the longtime readers and the few stragglers that come along for the ride. But the kinder, gentler, er, dumber Jack accidentally deleted it and emptied the trash so we'll have to do without for now.

Here is my response to your comments. I don't spend any time courting the brands. I don't pitch PR agencies about my blog. Don't spend any time talking to them about how influential my blog is. And I don't lose any sleep over that.

I don't feel an ounce of remorse for writing that some of the bloggers who are currently considered to be popular and or powerful would not be without gifts to give away. Their content is weak and their community is dependent upon the gifts they give.

This joint has moments of brilliance and moments of mediocrity. Over time it has developed a respectable following. I won't deny that I think it would be great to have six times as many uniques and ten times the number of comments. It would be great.

But I want to earn that. I don't want to by popularity. We're not the Yankees. We don't use our enormous payroll to buy championships. We earn them.

Anyway, I appreciate your note and hope that you stick around for a while. Leave me a comment or two- show some love 'cuz a bitter old guy like me can use it. ;)

Did She Die?

Sometimes I despise the sterility of email. The cold and unfeeling manner of text sent via electronics. You can be a master wordsmith and still fail miserably in your attempt to fill your words with warmth, caring and love.

I was on Facebook and I noticed that a friend had posted a photo album in memory of a sibling. As you might have guessed I am not especially close with this person. We are friendly and connected on Facebook because we did. The reason doesn't really matter.

Anyway, many years ago I was friendly with their sibling but we lost touch. It must be 15 years or so since we last spoke. I was more than a little surprised to see this photo album. It didn't offer any explanation about what happened, but it is hard to believe that someone would write in memory of about someone who is alive.

When I saw it I was shocked. They were my age and I was quite anxious to find out what happened. I don't have a telephone number for my friend on Facebook and didn't want to email them just to ask for it. We don't have any mutual friends that I can contact to ask what happened.

I tried running a search but didn't locate any information. But I couldn't just ignore it. So I sent an email and asked what happened. I tried hard to write something appropriate, but I am not sure that such words exist.

It was far more tactful than the headline of this post. And now I find myself wondering what the answer to the question is. What happened and how. It throws me a bit. It is Elul, won't be long before it is time to chant Unataneh Tokef.

So many questions.

Special Forces- Science Explains Their Reaction To Stress

This is a very interesting article about why some people handle stress better than others do. Dr. Andy Morgan of Yale Medical School conducted research to determine why some people handle stress better than others do.

His research took him to Fort Bragg which where the Army's elite Airborne and Special Forces school is located. Let's take a look at an excerpt from the article.

"For Morgan, POW school was the perfect place to study who survives the best under acute stress. If you think it's just training and the soldiers know they're not really in serious danger, consider what Morgan discovered. During mock interrogations, the prisoners' heart rates skyrocket to more than 170 beats per minute for more than half an hour, even though they aren't engaging in any physical activity. Meanwhile, their bodies pump more stress hormones than the amounts actually measured in aviators landing on aircraft carriers, troops awaiting ambushes in Vietnam, skydivers taking the plunge or patients awaiting major surgery. The levels of stress hormones are sufficient to turn off the immune system and to produce a catabolic state, in which the body begins to break down and feed on itself. The average weight loss in three days is 22 pounds.

Morgan's research—the first of its kind—produced some fascinating findings about who does the best job resisting the interrogators and who stays focused and clearheaded despite the uncontrollable fear. Morgan looked at two different groups going through this training: regular Army troops like infantrymen, and elite Special Forces soldiers, who are known to be especially "stress hardy" or cool under pressure. At the start or base line, the two groups were essentially the same, but once the stress began, and afterward, there were significant differences. Specifically, the two groups released very different amounts of a chemical in the brain called neuropeptide Y. NPY is an abundant amino acid in our bodies that helps regulate our blood pressure, appetite, learning and memory. It also works as a natural tranquilizer, controlling anxiety and buffering the effects of stress hormones like norepenephrine, one of the chemicals that most of us simply call adrenaline. In essence, NPY is one of the fire hoses that your brain uses to extinguish your alarm and fear responses by keeping the frontal-lobe parts of your brain working longer under stress.

Morgan found one very specific reason that Special Forces are superior survivors: they produce significantly greater levels of NPY compared with regular troops. In addition, 24 hours after completing survival training, Special Forces soldiers returned to their original levels of NPY while regular soldiers were significantly below normal."

So if this NPY serves as a sort of natural anti-anxiety drug I have to ask the obvious question. Can we find a way to produce it? Maybe I am being naive, but from a laymen's perspective it sounds like it could be a great resource for people. It might allow some people to stop taking their meds.

Another part of the article that I thought was interesting is the section in which they discussed heart rate variability. Take a look at this:

It turns out that the best survivors don't have a lot of heart-rate variability. Instead, they've got "metronomic heartbeats"—their hearts thump steadily like metronomes—with almost no variability between beats. That is, the intervals between the beats are evenly spaced. Morgan believes that a metronomic heartbeat is an easy way to detect good survivors and high neuropeptide Y releasers. It makes sense biologically because your brainstem, which controls your heartbeat, has a high density of neuropeptide Y.

Part of what I found interesting was that the article says that metronomic heartbeat is associated with early heart disease and sudden death. So there is a question about whether this is really a benefit. It is good if you are a soldier or in some sort of very stressful profession.

But if it is tied to heart disease the negative can potentially outweigh the positive. Nice to stay calm, but not at the expense of not living past fifty.

And That's The Way It Was- Goodbye Walter Cronkite

I always liked Walter Cronkite. Grew up watching him on the news.

(CNN) -- Walter Cronkite, the CBS anchorman known as "Uncle Walter" for his easygoing, measured delivery and "the most trusted man in America" for his rectitude and gravitas, has died, CBS reported Friday.

Cronkite was 92.

His career spanned much of the 20th century, as well as the first decade of the 21st. The native of St. Joseph, Missouri, broke in as a newspaper journalist while in college, switched over to radio announcing in 1935, joined the United Press wire service by the end of the decade and jumped to CBS and its nascent television news division in 1950. He also made his mark as an Internet contributor in his later years with a handful of columns for the Huffington Post.

He covered World War II's Battle of the Bulge, the Nuremberg trials, several presidential elections, moon landings, the assassination of President John F. Kennedy and the Watergate scandal of President Richard Nixon's administration.

At times he even made news: A 1977 question to then-Egyptian President Anwar Sadat about Sadat's intent to go to Israel -- at the time considered a nonstarter because of the lack of a treaty between the two countries -- received a surprising "yes" from the Egyptian leader.

Soon after, Sadat traveled to Jerusalem, a trip that eventually led to the Camp David Accords, which included a peace deal between Israel and Egypt.

At his height of influence as CBS anchorman, Cronkite's judgment was believed so important it could affect even presidents. In early 1968, after the Tet Offensive, Cronkite traveled to Vietnam and gave a critical editorial calling the Vietnam War "mired in stalemate."

Noting Cronkite's commentary, President Lyndon Johnson reportedly said, "If I've lost Cronkite, I've lost Middle America." Johnson announced he would not seek re-election less than two months later.

Goodbye Ed

CNN reports that Ed McMahon has died. It has some interesting information. I was unaware that he served as a Marine in WWII andKorea

Time Names World's Most Influential People

Damn, they left me off of the list again.

More on Columbine

Today is the ten year anniversary of the Columbine tragedy. Since many of my readers were on vacation last week I thought that I'd follow up on that post with another.

As I said in my initial post I have always been bothered by the attempt to explain the actions of the perpetrators of this atrocity as somehow having been tied into bullying.

It is understandable that in the face of tragedy people try to understand why things happen. But I cannot accept an explanation that absolves these two monsters of responsibility for their actions.

More importantly if you read some of the stories that have come out about that day you will see that Klebold and Harris were not the victims of bullying. Still, even if they had been there is no excuse for their actions. The majority of the world does not resort to violence in the face of mistreatment.

"(CNN) -- What do you remember about April 20, 1999?

If you recall that two unpopular teenage boys from the Trench Coat Mafia sought revenge against the jocks by shooting up Columbine High School, you're wrong.

But you're not alone.

Ten years after the massacre in Littleton, Colorado, there's still a collective memory of two Goth-obsessed loners, Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold, who went on a shooting rampage and killed 12 of their classmates and a teacher, injured 23 others and then turned their guns on themselves.

Journalist and author Dave Cullen was one of the first to take on what he calls the myths of Columbine. He kept at it for a decade, challenging what the media and law enforcement officials reported.

"Kids had never been attacked in this kind of way until Columbine," he recently told CNN. "I just had to find out what happened to those kids."

Cullen's book,"Columbine," was released this month -- just in time for today's 10th anniversary of the shooting at the Colorado high school. While tackling popular misconceptions, Cullen also gives a riveting account of what happened that day and how the survivors view the event that marked their lives forever.

Cullen concluded that the killers weren't part of the Trench Coat Mafia, that they weren't bullied by other students and that they didn't target popular jocks, African-Americans or any other group. A school shooting wasn't their initial intent, he said. They wanted to bomb their school in an attack they hoped would make them more infamous than Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh."

If you think about it, that last sentence makes it all the more frightening.

Probably Not a Smart Thing to Say

Hulk Hogan, what the hell were you thinking when you said all this crap.

(CNN) -- Pro wrestling legend Hulk Hogan, embroiled in a bitter divorce with his wife, Linda, told Rolling Stone magazine he can "totally understand" O.J. Simpson, the former football great found liable for the deaths of his wife and another man.

"I could have turned everything into a crime scene like O.J., cutting everybody's throat," Hogan said in the interview for a feature that will run in Friday's edition of the magazine.

"You live half a mile from the 20,000-square-foot home you can't go to anymore, you're driving through downtown Clearwater [Florida] and see a 19-year-old boy driving your Escalade, and you know that a 19-year-old boy is sleeping in your bed, with your wife... .

"I totally understand O.J. I get it," Hogan said

A spokeswoman for Rolling Stone magazine confirmed the quote to CNN.

It has been widely reported that Linda Hogan, 49, is dating a younger man. She filed for divorce in 2007 after nearly 25 years of marriage.

Columbine: Ten Years Later

USA Today has an interesting retrospective about the terrible school shooting at Columbine High School.

In the aftermath I have heard any number of explanations for why these two monsters acted as they did. A number of them suggested that bullying might have been among the primary reasons for their actions.

That has always troubled me. I don't pretend to have a degree in psychology or to be any sort of expert in the field of mental health. I can understand to an extent how if someone was being bullied that they might want to strike back at the person(s) who were doing this. But this goes far beyond that.

Take a look at this excerpt from the article:

What's now beyond dispute — largely from the killers' journals, which have been released over the past few years, is this: Harris and Klebold killed 13 and wounded 24, but they had hoped to kill thousands.

The pair planned the attacks for more than a year, building 100 bombs and persuading friends to buy them guns. Just after 11 a.m. on April 20, they lugged a pair of duffel bags containing propane-tank bombs into Columbine's crowded cafeteria and another into the kitchen, then stepped outside and waited.

Had the bombs exploded, they'd have killed virtually everyone eating lunch and brought the school's second-story library down atop the cafeteria, police say. Armed with a pistol, a rifle and two sawed-off shotguns, the pair planned to pick off survivors fleeing the carnage.

As a last terrorist act, a pair of gasoline bombs planted in Harris' Honda and Klebold's BMW had been rigged apparently to kill police, rescue teams, journalists and parents who rushed to the school — long after the pair expected they would be dead.

The pair had parked the cars about 100 yards apart in the student lot. The bombs didn't go off.

Read a bit further on and you see that money limited their ability to murder. A lack of finances helped to save lives.

But if we go back to the subject of bullying what bothers me is that I have a hard time accepting that bullying pushed them so far over the edge that they would be willing to murder so many who had nothing to do with them.

They were sick individuals who took a cowards way out and by that I refer to all of their actions that day, from start to finish.

Crocodiles Eat People Too

I don't think that I have ever been so drunk that I thought that I was invincible. Being eaten alive is on my list of things that frighten me. In fact it is within the top three.

Those of you who know me are aware that while I may have my own streak of crazy, there are simple rules. For example while I would prefer not to fight a Great White Shark in the ocean, I'd give it a go on land.

And though I'd prefer not to fight a croc, if I had a choice I'd meet it on land as well. The point being that I do my best to stack the odds in my favor.

"Northern Territory police have found the remains of the man who was attacked and killed by a crocodile yesterday near the Daly River community, 150 kilometres south of Darwin.

Early yesterday morning the 20-year-old man and a friend had been drinking, when they tried to swim across the crocodile-infested waterway near the Daly River community.

A crocodile was seen near the pair when the man disappeared.

Police set up an exclusion zone on the river as part of their search to find him.

This morning that search came to an end when rangers found his remains 80 metres downstream.
A 4.3-metre crocodile is believed to have killed the man and has been destroyed.

Duty Superintendent Jamie Chalker says the missing man was one of two who swam across the river to go and get some alcohol."

Warning- The Polar Bear Will Eat You

I want to assume that this woman was mentally ill, but who knows.

BERLIN, Germany (CNN) -- A polar bear attacked a woman at Berlin Zoo Friday afternoon after she climbed a fence and jumped into its habitat during feeding time, police said Saturday.

One adult polar bit her several times after she plunged into the moat, police said.

Zoo workers tossed rescue rings toward the woman to hoist her out and distract polar bears swimming nearby, said Goerg Gebhard, a Berlin police officer.

"They saved her life," Gebhard told CNN.

John Wooden on Success

Not unlike so many others I am a fan of Coach Wooden.

Running a Background Check on People

Earlier today I was reading through the latest edition of Haveil Havalim when a link on the side of the page caught my eye and I clicked over.

I found myself reading a review of a service that anyone can hire to conduct background checks on people. It never ceases to amaze me just how much information is readily available to people who wish to find it and I can't say that I am happy about it.

It is not that I am trying to hide deep secrets. If someone from my past wants to find me it is really not that hard to do. I am accessible. But there is something disconcerting about just anyone being able to acquire so much information about me.

Call me paranoid, but I am concerned about identity theft and it bothers me to see that it is so easy to acquire this data without having to provide any sort of cause/justification for it.

What do you think? Does it bother you to know that your personal information is accessible to anyone with DSL and a credit card?

Newsweek Lists Top 50 Rabbis Again

We covered the last two times so we might as well hit this one too. Course some of my favorite rabbis aren't on that list.