Reviews: Books without Plots; House of Blues

 If someone were to recommend a book to you, and tell you it had no plot, you might look at them a bit strangely.  What is a fiction book without the dynamic plot twists, the beginning, middle, and denouement that we so desire?  And believe me, I've read books like that.  Trying to get through a Don Delillo book was enough to give me a nervous breakdown.  But believe me when I say that some of the best books are those that have no plot, because the plot is simply a vehicle to provide philosophy, or a diatribe that would not otherwise be read.  Sorta like this blog.  Take for instance Neal Stephenson's Anathem, reviewed here, which is much like taking Plato and putting him in a science fiction setting.  A marvelous book, but one which is at its best when the plot takes a back seat.  In fact, the end is only non-satisfying because it has to end with plot resolution.

Other wonderful books without plot:

You must read Michael Nesmith's The Long Sandy Hair of Neftoon Zamora. Yes, he is one of the singers of The Monkees, the best one, in my opinion, and yes, his mother invented liquid paper. So he has time to write books and do whatever he wants to do.  The book is as relaxing as his music, as thoughtful and lyrical...well, until the end when a bad guy shows up (symbolizing the epitome of capitalism gone extremely wrong) and the book abruptly ends.  You can read the first 6 chapters of the book here.

The Island by Gary Paulsen reads very much like Thoreau's Walden, and must have been a work of meditation while working on other books like The Hatchet, as the main character basically gets into his boat and wanders around the lake and sees birds and parts of nature and expounds upon them and life.  Sounds extremely boring for a kid's book, but it's wonderful, for those that want that sort of thing.

Also along that same line is the Selected Works of T.S. Spivet, by Reif Larsen, which is philosophical and very relaxing, from the mountains of Idaho to the train ride through the plain states to Chicago.  Then the plot takes over and it seemed like the book just wanted to end.  In my opinion, the book was much better when it meandered around endlessly, much like the travels of the narrator.

I say all this to recommend The Elegance of a Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery. Two apartment dwellers, in upper class Paris, a concierge in her 50's, alone, with a phobia about people discovering that she is extremely intelligent,  and discusses in her journal post-modern French philosophy to Japanese films to still-life art.  Intertwined, of course, with a similarly brilliant 12 year old girl who writes journals about the small things in life, determined to find a reason worth living before she kills herself on her 13th birthday.  Amazing work  in the vignettes in each chapter, looking at life in a new way.  There was a review that I read, said that the reviewer's psychologist  recommended this book over taking Prozac.  Don't know if I'd carry it that far, as the ending comes right out of a Lifetime made-for-TV movie, as if Barbery just needed an ending that tied up the pieces.  It would work better if the journals were carried out longer, with the interactions between the characters longer.  It would work well as an online-blog-story.  So I enjoyed the book very much, but only if the plot stayed far back behind the words.  On a personal note, this was the last book I read while eating lunch in the Borders break room.  Now I have to read using my Kobo or a regular book (of which I have multitudes), but I will have to find a way to do it at home.  Too many electronic distractions....must get around that.

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Review: Hugh Laurie's album Let Them Talk

Why do all Actors want to be Singers? (or for that matter, why do all Singers want to be Actors?) Turns out, it's because there are quite a few people that have multiple talents.  Go watch Jimmy Fallon's Late Night on NBC (watch the Linoleum peel while Jay Leno's on, it's about the same amount of entertainment).  He can do anything he wants, from singing to playing instruments to dancing...comedy... amazing stuff.  He's about as close to Johnny Carson as you're gonna get these days.  Or Wayne Brady, on Who's Line he did most anything for a laugh. Or Justin Timberlake , but I've discussed him here.

Turns out, Hugh Laurie fits this mold, too.  Originally a British comedian (yes, I know he's British, but he did a comedy routine in Great Britain), his role of Dr. House on House leaves me in stitches, while being perfectly serious.  An anti-hero in the vein of Thomas Covenant in Stephen R. Donaldson's books.  But if you watch the TV show, you see him take down a guitar or play at a piano.  Well, that's him, it's not stunt fingers.  Turns out, he's been a fan of Blues music since he was a little tike, forced to take piano lessons.  The only song he liked playing in the instruction booklet was "Suwanee River."  So now that he has all this fame and fortune, he sought out masters of the Blues genre and they accompany him on different tracks.  You can read reviews online, and you'll find them praising his instrumental talent, but not liking his voice.  I disagree with them, since I've been a fan of folk music like Bob Dylan and David Gray, the nasal voice is something I enjoy.  I agree with Shawn Mullins in his album notes from No. 9, that recording blues and folk should be an instantaneous act, with imperfections included, because without that, it's not real.  It's just professionally made crap that everyone else makes.  But to feel like your in one of the bars in New Orleans, or on the streets listening to a musician that hasn't had a day of voice training in his whole life, where the song comes from emotion and grit, from someplace down in his guts.... that's the real stuff.  That's what this album is.  As usual, I'll add a video from youtube, this time an introduction to his music (probably off of the deluxe edition.)

Angry Birds Vs. Gears of War.

Well, Gears of War 3 came out today.  I saw the commercial for it last night, as well as one called Rage.  To be honest, and I know this will probably send someone into fits, but they look pretty much the same. To be honest, I've never been a big 1st person shooter player, well, except for Half-Life, which was an amazing game! Maybe it was the memories of the time around playing it, in college, usually with friends, etc... and so that got me thinking about the difference between these games, the ones that I like playing (I'm playing now Alice: Madness Returns, the follow up to American McGee's Alice), and the addicting games that are on Facebook or on Android, such as Angry Birds

First off, I don't see the hype in Angry Birds.  I tried playing it once, and found it low key and either really easy or really hard.  There wasn't really anything to keep me playing. No explosions or power-ups to stimulate my ADHD mentality, nor anything brain-bending to keep my brain interested in the game.  I would much rather play a round of Worms: Armageddon where a Holy Hand Grenade or Exploding Sheep can be used as weapons.  And there you have to take into consideration wind speed and angle...etc.... and you can play with friends in multiplayer mode.

I've always thought of video games as being something better done in isolation, strictly a one-player affair.  When my friends were over playing games, I never saw the point, as it didn't allow for any interaction between me and whoever it was that was over.  Imagine the interaction between friends as arrows, and then if we're playing a board game, or something like Basketball outside, the interactions are directly between one person and the other.  But when watching TV or playing Video games, the interaction is with the screen, and so there's no real bonding occurring.  With today's technology, multiplayer games, from one computer to another, from one country to another, is possible, linking people all over the world, and you see the other person as the sniper on the building, or the guy with the giant energy blaster shooting you to smithereens.  The interaction actually goes through the monitor and into the other person.  Friendship is still possible in this way, unlike the more passive approach of just watching someone play a game on one monitor.

Unfortunately, I've never been very good at the games that are popular right now.  My brother can, as a sniper, see that pixel way off in the distance, pick it off, and sure enough, it's another player.  And in the realm of StarCraft, I tend to be more build oriented, more defensive, whereas those that play it with any regularity like attacking and destroying.  It's why I liked Spore so much, until it got to the stages that resembled Warcraft and the like. This probably has something to do with me actually being anti-social.... I just don't like playing such games, where I have to interact with people I've either never seen before, or I end up just being an easy kill and there's no fun in it.
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So let's return to Gears of War vs. Angry Birds. Taking the social aspect out of playing a video game for a second, playing either game does basically the same thing neurologically. I've often talked about video games as being a method of escape, much like reading or watching television. It's a stimulation that engages the visual senses (Neil Postman would have a ball with today's technology and how we use it to communicate with one another), engages the emotions, increases adrenaline, gives us the taste for victory that we once had winning the war on actual battlefields. We can play NFL football without actually being athletes, wearing jock straps, getting ourselves injured, or being in front of thousands of fans. But we get the same rush when our pixelated wide receiver runs into the end zone for a touchdown.

So does playing Bejeweled Blitz, for instance, provide the same biological needs as going out and buying Gears of War 3? There are so many games on the Internet now, through, ironically, social media, that are free, stimulating, and more time consuming, than paying $250 dollars for a console, $60 for a game, and then bringing it home. Granted, it is well worth it to play the masterpieces in Video Game Art as they come out. The computer I have now I originally bought so I could play games like Psychonauts, as the older one I had wouldn't even play the games I saw at Big Lots. And it's well worth playing Little Big Planet for the music soundtrack alone. Those experiences are worth it. The game designers are much like filmmakers, writers, or artists, in that the world they create is as much a part of the creative process as Leonardo painting the Mona Lisa, or Schumann composing "Arabesque." Some video games are experiences that can affect one emotionally, or, dare I say it, change a life. This is something that endless hours of Angry Birds can't do, other than adding pounds around the waist.

In the end, it's about how we spend our time. James Taylor wrote, "The secret of life is enjoying the passage of time." Daivd Crosby wrote a song, "Time is the Final Currency." We work and spend our money so that we might enjoy the time we have on Earth. It just depends on how we want to enjoy that time spent. Do we want to fling birds at pigs, or combine 3 of the same jewels, or do we want to engage ourselves in masterpieces of alternate realities? I guess it all depends on how much time we have to play.

To Think or not to Think.

[Reason] is a faculty that man has to exercise by choice. Thinking is not an automatic function. In any hour and issue of his life, man is free to think or to evade that effort.
Ayn Rand “The Objectivist Ethics,” The Virtue of Selfishness, pg. 20.

I've come to believe that metacognition is what keeps me going.  In other words, thinking on how we think.  Working retail is not so bad when you are seeing in every selection and deselection the thoughts behind each customer. For instance, the squalling kids who just want their parents to buy them something, not out of hunger or desire for the object, but merely for the attention that they get as their parents' hand them the trinket.  Materialism is actually a sign of love.  Or perhaps the children who open up the box or the toy in the middle of the floor and start playing with it, as if it were their own, without realization that what they have isn't theirs to begin with.  Of course, that has nothing to do with ownership, but frankly because they could care less about the object they have in their hands.  It's the idea of material inflation.  The more we have, the less we care about what we have. 

Then there's the customer who must decide what they want by eliminating everything else from sight first hand.  I found a couple of interesting examples one day while working in the kids' section.  The parent kept asking the child, "What do you want? Make up your mind."  The obvious answer to this is, she wants everything.  And when she kept changing her mind, much to the consternation of her mom, she realized it was upsetting her mom, so she kept at it, playing a game of ambivalence just to see if she could.  Pressing her mom's buttons.  Because she truly did want everything.  The only way to ask the question is, "What do you not want?  Because then she is forced to eliminate everything she truly doesn't want and then pick from those remaining.  It sounds really hard, but it's not.... trust me.   Because I see it everyday.  At the grocery store, I would have customers come up to the register with 100's of dollars of groceries, but only have $30.  Therefore they would then decide, having eliminated the rest of the store, what they don'twant from the rest, and keep on filtering out the "No's" until they have reached their financial goal.  It's often the duality of thought that makes the little decisions of life interesting, because what you are really thinking is the exact opposite of what you think you are thinking. 

So when I realized the "duality" of thought is actually quite wonderful to think about, I ran across the Ayn Rand quote above.  Sometimes, in thinking things through, we are actually not thinking at all.  Letting our inhibitions and self-control go.  This can easily be seen in the riots after sporting events, (which I've talked about before), where what they are thinking, what they are truly thinking, and the fact that they are basically not thinking at all, are different.  Take the past riots in London.  They started because of a racial issue in one of London's suburbs, but soon, it became more about the class structure in Great Britain brought about by entitlement spending and a Progressive government that has felt the strain on its budget much like the rest of the world.  In other words, the riots were about the cuts in government hand-outs, although they were supposed to be about police brutality and race.  What actually happened was that the youth of Great Britain wanted to be seen rioting and have fun while getting on YouTube, all the while stealing and taking advantage of lawlessness to attain material things that they would have had to pay money for.  In other words, they weren't thinking at all.  It all went to the subconscious "monster" that Jung talked about, that below the rational thoughts of the human mind there is the base desires of an animal that decrees those desires are above all else.  And those who cannot control their subconscious demons are doomed to act in those manners, and will generally end up in jail, or worse.  

So it came to pass, that after I saw this quote, two stories popped up online to illustrate my point.  I am all for putting media in my blogs when it supports my ideas, and these work wonders.  First, the story in Australia, where a teenager decides to run out in front of a train.  He didn't have anyone with a camera, so being on YouTube wasn't his motive.  He wasn't suicidal, cause he wouldn't have dodged the locomotive. He simply wanted to see if he could do it.  And that isn't thinking at all!  That's not to say that we all haven't done stupid things without thinking (or perhaps with thinking, as he had to time his rush across the tracks to the point where he would almost but not quite get hit by it), and I've done a couple of insane things.   I remember one time I had done something or another, and my dad got really mad and was coming down the hallway.  So I decided to see what would happen if I tripped him.  So I stuck my leg out...and he tripped.  There was no thinking involved in the act, just pure stupidity.... much like touching the base of an iron, or sticking your finger in the car cigarette lighter (both of which I've done).  It's an infantile move, just to experience something, the rush of adrenaline, the heat of the flame, the cold on the tongue as you lick a metal pole ("I double dog dare ya!").  It's what we do.  And as we get older, the desire to do something just to satisfy the curiosity of the subconscious mind, it is replaced by the discipline of conscious thought.  Except..... sometimes that doesn't work.  We go skydiving, or bungee jumping, or we walk across the Oconee River train track bridge just to see if we can do it.



Does the human mind have the ability to think at all?  Are we simply holding back the battering ram of the subconscious mind as it attempts to break down the barriers we've put in it's way?  And when we speak of today's youth, languishing in public schools or in universities, are they just as apt to study for their PhD as visit the bars every night and get themselves killed in car wrecks or wind up vomiting in the public bathrooms in their dorms? Is there any hope for the human race when thinking is not considered "cool?" Public opinion thinking people has probably not been as low as it has today, unless we count the Medieval times when the Lords or the Church kept people under their stern watch. Those that are famous have become stupid on purpose, and those that are intelligent are made fun of.  Look at the sit-coms of today's television.  Those that are intelligent are naturally nerds, probably gay, and social outcasts.  Those that are dumb are so often rich and usually wind up getting their way despite any lack of "smarticals." 

The answer is, I think, "yes."  There are some people in this world who will overcome the outside world and use their minds to become producers and masters.  Makers and Philosophers.  And they will sit atop the towers of the cities and look down on us in pity, perhaps humorously, as Mustapha did in Brave New World, while the primitives are easily manipulated, controlled, by those who would keep them enslaved by contentment in mediocrity.  Take, for instance, the next story below, about a boy who, being only 12, has read books and educated himself about medicine and the like.  As he was watching TV at 2 in the morning, a show about showgirls (probably Real Sex on HBO,) he heard his mom, 9 months pregnant, call for him.  She was giving birth.  I would have froze, called 911, and panicked, but this particular child delivered the baby there in his home, using the information he had read in his studies.  So there is hope, after all, that today's world will not slip into the mindless, unthinking, audience of the flickering TVs that shine lights in strobe effects out the windows. 

There might be a few men or women that will use the mind to progress past the conveniences they have been given and venture forth, and the thoughts will not be of desires alone, but to apply knowledge towards a goal, permanent, miraculous, that will satiate the needs of both conscious and subconscious minds. 

Through the Looking Glass: Video Games and Literature

Have you read The Little Prince? I'm sure we're all familiar. Kid lives on a planet (B612) with a half-a-house, a Rose Girl, and three volcanoes (one extinct). And that's all. The space geese fly him up to where comets are coming by and he snatches one with a butterfly net and whizzes off other worlds. I feel like he does, a lot of the time, trapped on that tiny microcosm of a planet, waiting for the right chunk of rock to take me someplace different. Except, for this traveler, the worlds exist in my head. I guess they all exist in our heads, and we strive to create these worlds for ourselves. We dream them every night, worlds similar to our own, but more fantastic. If I could build the bookstores I've seen in my dreams, they would be truly amazing! It seems our society has become enamored with playing God, in our dreams, our writings, in the images that flash upon the wall, and, for people in my generation or younger, in our video games. We've created world after world to escape into, from the most primitive of pixelation, Commander Keen, for instance, to the epic worlds that Nintendo and the like have created. And I have gone into my fascination with The Legend of Zelda games before, and I curse Nintendo for putting the new games on a system where you actually have to move to enjoy the full effect of the game. I just want to press buttons. But I digress...



The most recent games I've been playing are Where the Wild Things Are, reviewed here. This video game is uniquely designed, for the book has no real plot, at least, not on the island. And so
the game designers had to look to their own imaginations, and Maurice Sendak and David Eggers' movie script, to develop this amazing piece of literary real estate. And with that, they did such a wonderful job. What a lot of the reviewers online don't get is that the game isn't really about hack 'n slash, killing enemies, or even winning the game. Instead, it's about the island itself, and the characters. It's jumping into a world where there are no chores, no going to work, no dealing with insane customers and co-workers. It's jumping into a world of forests, mountains, furry creatures that have problems, but not real ones. It is escapism into what Tolkien called the land of Faerie, the undeveloped potential that comes forth in our dreams and fantasies. It becomes the lands of Narnia, Fantasia, Middle-Earth, and Where the Wild Things Are, because each of those worlds existed inside of their creators. And how wonderful are each of the makers that they would share that land with us, to exist in for just a little while?

With each video game, the goal is to make a world out of that mold so that we can all exist inside of it, but also to make it entertaining. There must be evil as well as good, something to threaten the very peace that we yearn for inside those realms. A game about Transformers wouldn't be very exciting if there were no Decepticons to keep things lively, even as much as I don't like 1st person shooters, you have to have something to shoot at.

But back to literature.... children's picture books provide a grand opportunity for video game makers to do whatever they want with the world within the pages, as long as it fits into the mold the author originally intended. How marvelous would it be to take the illustrations of Colin Thompson and turn them into video games? They would be perfect for the "hidden object" genre, but I think it would be better to delve into the lands he created at the corners of our world. Seriously, everyone needs to pick up Searching for Atlantis and gander at it for a while.

Other picture books that would make great games.... Harold and the Purple Crayon would work well as a Wii game or for the other interactive systems. Let us create our own worlds with crayons, solve puzzles, overcome bad guys, go outside the lines for a time. The books of Graeme Base would also make interesting video games. He's already got an App for those that play with such things. .. Chris Van Allsburg's Jumanji isn't a stretch at all (as I'm sure that's already been done, but probably for older consoles...a new refresh would be better). One last illustrator that has picture books ripe for video game adaptation would be David Wiesner.  I am most familiar with his work Sector 7, which would make a wonderful racing game with a surreal feel to it.

 But plot lines (and more words) make for better guidelines when making a video game, so games like American McGee's Alice can draw off of the author's talent as well as the designers.  In Alice, the game is a sequel to the books by Lewis Carroll.  Alice is the only survivor of a horrific fire that destroys her house and family.  Then she is committed to a mental institution where she is drawn back into a twisted version of Wonderland, where the mangy Cheshire cat (with an earring now) teaches Alice to become a mean killing machine with the Vorpal Blade and a deck of cards.  The lean, but spectacular, graphics of the first game are now replaced in Alice: Madness Returns with a gorgeous recreation of Wonderland (using the updated Unreal engine which didn't exist when the original was made in 1997).  The background is filled with references to the literary work, although in often twisted ways. I have a feeling that, like WTWTA, critics are probably going to pan the ease of which the game is played, as well as the platform-ish characteristics, but those are what makes it fun.  Sometimes the difficulty of a game gets in the way of being totally immersed in the world.  A good balance turns the game from forgetful or nightmarish to totally engrossing.  Take a look at the Final Fantasy or Zelda games for examples.


Some other books that should be made into Video Games:

• Gulliver's Travels, by Jonathan Swift. In what would be called The Further Adventures of, Gulliver can go to any of the worlds in Swift's imagination, complete with the references to the world of British Academia, the moronic state of politics and war, etc... and then go to other worlds as fits the twisted mind of the Irish Satirist. One only has to read "A Modest Proposal" to see how outrageous he was in pointing out the problems of his society. Bring in subtle pokes at today's world, and there's a great game for anyone, adults or children alike. I've found this work on several sites that talked about Literary Works as Video Games.

• The Little Prince by Antoine de Saint-Exupery. This one is already half done, with a French company having produced a CCG TV series with spectacular graphics and an engrossing plot that would make a great game for any age.
  

• The Wizard of Oz by Frank L. Baum. This world parallels Alice's wonderland in magnificence and in plot, where a sequel or a spot on working of the original series (Baum made many books pertaining to Oz), would be amazing.  Especially with upcoming renditions of the work being made in theatres.  I suspect this will be coming in the not so distant future.

•   I would love to see a video game made of Steven Hall's The Raw Shark Texts. That would be fun, to battle beings made up of data, words, thoughts... this would be a great first person shooter game in the vein of Bioshock.

• Michael Ende wrote The Neverending Story, and while I would love to find the hardback book that looks just like the one in the movie (one of my favorites), I would want the video game to be based on the book instead.  The book is considerably different from the movie, with much more depth and wonders that would make for lots of playing time.  

• Andrew came up with a good idea, and I've seen it on quite a few similar lists before, as well. Because video games don't have to be just about fantasy worlds. I've always loved small town nostalgia, the yearning for simpler times, and so how ironic would it be to have Mark Twain's The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn as a video game. The book is very episodic, with plenty of action, or it could be more of a free flowing environment like the old Game Boy Advance title The Sims, Bustin' Out (great game, BTW). Story and Goal oriented, but with a fair amount of free play as well.

There are a number of worlds I'd love to see as a video game. Anne McCaffrey's Pern world would be great as an Ultima Online type world where you build up skills through learning your trade, as well as hopefully training a dragon and fighting Thread. Or Stephen R. Donaldson's Thomas Covenant Trilogy.  Or one based on Ender's Game, by Orson Scott Card. I think that's already in the work, along with a movie.  All the worlds out there in the dreamscape, from the minds of the great authors' who have molded their creations, expanded and pixelized by the computer programmers that can seemingly do anything with 1's and 0's.  I guess the ultimate achievement would be Star Trek's Holodeck, but perhaps it's better not to live in our fantasy worlds all the time.  That's why books, and video games, will have to suffice, for now.

The Science Building of Perpetual Twilight

Twilight seemed to hang over the Science building at Georgia College in Milledgeville. Some sort of perpetual gloom that I never quite understood.  Even when my Chemistry 101 classes were held at noon, I went inside the building and felt it was always dusk.  Perhaps it was the colors of the walls and the seats, oranges and dull yellows from the 70's when they were popular, or maybe it was the slowness of the elevator, one of the slowest ones I had seen. And in my Astronomy 101 class,

the labs we took were located in the basement, on computers from the 1980's, old Apple IIe clones, and this was 1996.  It was as if someone had taken the whole science building and stopped time around it, making it obsolete and rickety. Even the newest of technologies were out of date.  I witnessed my first laserdisc player there. And only. I've never seen one in use. 

I say all this because in the last magazine published from GC&SU, it was all about the revamped Science building, about the futuristic architecture, the white walls and plenitude of glass. About the new equipment and the benefits that new science research would do for the college.  That, along with Allan Bloom's book The Closing of the American Mind, made me think about the old rickety building and the uses for Science in a university  mainly driven toward the Liberal Arts, as well as the sudden change of ideas that the college seemed to have during the beginning of this new economy.

One of the main highlights of Bloom's writings was the perception of the student riots at the university level during the 1960's.  While some, such as at Kent State, became deadly, there were others, such as the student strikes at Cornell, that had a drastic effect on the university system, especially those in the northern United States.  What struck me as fascinating was his view of the professors in the Humanities areas versus those of the Natural Sciences.  The ideas of Cultural Relativism (which I talked about earlier) were very much understood by the professors of the Liberal Arts (while perhaps not always agreed with). But the Science departments remained out of the conflicts between teachers, students, and the administration, because there is no relativism in science. It is either one way or the other. And no one can argue with this, as the scientific method had be held as divine for many years.  So the chasm between the study of man and the study of nature widened.It's my belief that this is exactly what happened at Georgia College & State University during the period between the 1960's and the present day. But to take a look at this more closely, we have to see why the leftover supplies were relegated to the science building while the English department received a brand new, state of the art (at the time) building. To answer this question, we have to, as Bloom did, look at the function of the University to the State and to the people. 

The university system does two things, train citizens for future jobs, to be competitive in the job market, and to bring forth the best people to drive the economy of this nation.  Secondly, they are used to further the education of people who wish to know more than just the basic knowledge.  The university serves as the bank for knowledge for those who have been outside of Plato's cave and wish to pursue self-enlightenment through the wisdom of ancestors. And between the two, therein lies the chasm of knowledge versus a skill set. Both are valuable, both are vital, but unfortunately, it's hard to get both in 4 years of college, combined with all the social things that usually occurs with going to an institution of higher learning.

And so it is, much like every other paradigm, that the pendulum swings back and forth depending on the circumstances.  With the launch of Sputnik by the Russians and the Cold War escalating after World War II, skill sets in science and engineering were needed for the competitive drive to send man to the moon. I think that it was at this point where the university system became a training ground for workers in the "field." People wanted to get degrees that would earn them money, quickly, efficiently, without the need for pausing to contemplate the philosophical aspects of mankind, or the inner thoughts of the mind, the subconscious...etc...  And this rush to fill America with highly qualified workers resulted in economic growth in the 1980's and 1990's, so much so that the need for skilled workers declined, even as money and income increased.  So, there were many wealthy families with children who could go to college, but had no need to get their hands dirty. Aside from the exploding computer industry, the fields of nursing and science (I'm sticking with these two because of the applicable examples they have at Georgia College), among others, declined in people, in funding, and in prestige.  When I arrived at Georgia College, the Nursing program was in a small building on the corner of the campus, almost invisible from the street.  And the science building was as I have described it.  The attention had shifted from science to the liberal arts, the Humanities, as they call them, so that students could learn, spend four years of their lives contemplating the vast meaning of everything, and earn a degree in something that basically does nothing in the work field.  I am not saying that the degree I received, a BA in English, isn't valuable, or that I wouldn't have done the exact same thing if I had to do it all over again, but the skill sets that I learned are significantly less, and will earn less money, than those degrees in computers, or medicine, or science. 

I have long argued that students in High School and in college need to learn both a skill set to provide them the necessary income for the rest of their lives, as well as learning art, philosophy, music, literature.  There needs to be a balance.  A worker that can work with his hands as well as his mind is much more capable of adapting to any situation.  Unfortunately, that is not the case in today's world (for various reasons that are political as well as sociological, which would take a whole other blog to do), and so people have their diplomas, their degrees from college, and they are working either at a part time job not doing anything with their degree, or they are simply unemployed, while those that have a skill set, like fixing cars or assembling computers, are providing a living for themselves and happily watching reality tv at night (that statement is generalized, and an explanation would again take a whole other blog). 

In my dreams, I have seen a university system, a community coming together to learn, to train their skill sets and become experts in many fields, as well as discussing the various aspects of the humanities.  I think one needs to come with the other, with the time saved from the skill sets invested in the humanities.  Let us build a society that relies on science, technology, medicine, business, to make time for us all to enjoy the ideas brought on by the liberal arts. For every invention that saves an hour out of every person's life, that hour can be invested back into pushing humanity forward, both in the technological realm, but also in the realms of music, art, philosophy, and the inner workings of the human mind.  Think of what we could achieve if the ideas that are implemented from the science building in Milledgeville (and elsewhere) could save us enough time that we could go to functions during the week and further our education in areas that we enjoy.  There would be nothing that we couldn't do.  I know that when I return to Milledgeville next (whenever that may be), I will see a science building not in perpetual twilight, but in a sunrise that will fill the skies of that town.  Let the graduates offer the skills that bring us all a little more sunlight into our lives.  We all need it right now.

The Obligatory July 4th Post: The Making of a Pencil

I plan on doing very little writing on this, as it has already been done. Leonard Reed was the founder and president of the Foundation for Economic Education, and in 1958, published an essay entitled "I, Pencil," which is truly remarkable. It follows along the lines of the Jeep commercial I used in my Thanksgiving blog. As we drove to our daily chores this week, we passed by make shift tents selling fireworks. That along with the grocery store sales and the grills offered at Lowe's and other things, the Independence Day holiday is a prime example of the best thing about our country, the Free Market system. Capitalism isn't perfect. It has its flaws, Its corrupt users of the system who fill their pockets while emptying others, but in its purest form, that which is shown in Leonard Reed's essay, in the making of a pencil, it gives me a hope that mankind can live and abide by the rules of democracy and the free market. That each individual builds a part of this great country of ours, from the giant nuclear reactors, to the databases storing the data in this blog, to the pencils that 1st graders use to fill in their standardized tests. We all are a part of the system which creates the world we live in, and by that, this world forms and shapes our lives. I am proud to be a part of that system, even if it is just selling books. But those books might just help future creators of such miracles as are seen in science-fiction novels, just as the things today were put together by millions of individuals to form cell phones, computers, cars...etc...

For instance, take the tallest skyscraper in Atlanta, the Peachtree Tower. My dad was responsible for designing the sprinkler systems that keep the structure safe from fire. But he was just one of hundreds of people responsible for constructing that building. Likewise, the metal pipes stretching throughout the Oklahoma City Botanical Gardens were designed, by hand, by my father. We took a tour of the underside of the structure before it opened so we could see the fruits of his labor. By the time the Peachtree Tower was made, my dad had become one of the countries best sprinkler designers on the newly made AutoCad system.

So... here is this essay, written by Leonard Reed. I will include the link, here, to the original essay, but I find it much easier to listen to. It was read, in its entirety, by Mark Levin, talk show host and conservative author of Liberty and Tyranny.  Members of both ideological persuasions will enjoy the essay, while conservatives will love the comparisons Levin makes to President Obama in his editorial afterwards.  To me, it is all wonderful stuff.  Just what I wanted to hear coming home from work on a 4th of July

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Book Review: The Search for WondLa

It's one of the rare science fiction books written for children nowadays. Today's books are either half-comic diaries written for 3rd graders (I'm gonna write one too, it'll be called The Diary of a Blimpy Kid), or it's teen angst filled vampires and goth boys with dark eyebrows. Very little is what you would call speculative fiction. I have been impressed with the resurgence of "dystopian" worlds in the Young Adult section, although I have been a little hesitant to read them. The problem with writing most futuristic fiction is that you have to resist the urge to relate current political views with the outcome of mankind. It irks me when authors who are writing for entertainment decide to stick a platform from either party into a character. It usually sticks out like a sore thumb, turning an otherwise sympathetic character into a mechanical airhorn for a political party. And there have been some doosies in my reading. For instance, the Communist dragon in Alan Dean Foster's Spellsinger series. I stopped reading the book because of that. Or when Queen Amadala says, "And this is how freedom ends, with thunderous applause," during the newest Star Wars movies. And sometimes whole movies, like Avatar, are nothing but a platform for Environmental zealots, who are all anti-business and all for the government regulating everything. There are some recent books, like Brave Story, which I read a few months back, which has a little of that in it, but it's easy to overlook.

It's one of the main complaints I have with The Search for WondLa, as Rovendeer, the traveling Jimmy Cricket that accompanies Eva Nine on her journey, sometimes becomes a chorus that says general statements about the bad guys that are actually supposed to be about us.

The book itself, though, flows along quite nicely, with good plot twists and the usual "to be continued" thing at the end, as it's the beginning of a series. I read it quickly and easily, and would recommend it to any kid who liked Avatar, for instance, or Wall-E, which it was quite similar to, in theme. I always kept wondering, what would Orson Scott Card have done with this book? How much more depth and natural flow it would have had, even with the themes that were put in. As usual with children's books, it had a lot more potential. Of course, that's me talking, as the works of Card are books for adults that are about kids, and this book is a book for kids. How wonderful are those in which a balanced is reached.