“Jazz washes away the dust of everyday life.” (Art Blackey)
The “Spotted Cat” on unpretentious Frenchmen Street in New Orleans without a doubt serves as my favorite live music club in this city on our road trip tourist visits. For the high quality of horn band musicianship booked here combined with an always exuberant showing of jazz lovers simply “delivers” on every occasion we take in a jazz set or two there. So it felt very rewarding to conclude our latest stopover in “The Big Easy” on Saturday night with a performance of the talented, all female group , “Shake ‘Em Up” Jazz Band.
Check out a clip from this talented band in the link below or search them out on Spotify.
What qualities interest art lovers in French Impressionistic paintings?
“Find things beautiful as much as you can. Most people find too little beautiful.” (Ingred Fetell Lee)
I enjoy observing French Impressionistic Art for several reasons. First of all, I’m “drawn” to those serene scenes of countryside France painted with lightly delicate brushwork exuding subtle displays of color, light and shadow. I also notice with positive interest how such secular settings depict late 19th century leisure time amid nature in a spiritually calming way. As a further source of motivation, Impressionism often sparks my travel interest to find unique spots to similarly escape into such a world of pastoral bliss.
So for this particular blog, I became inspired by artist Claude Monet’s painting completed in 1876 titled “Lake in Montgeron” as shown in the title photo above. For in the first two days of our current roadtrip north through Florida, I intently set out to find such potential Impressionistic looking places of nature that Monet might have painted from that era. Interestingly there seemed to be a definite contrast between the two locations I found. For at Wekiwa Springs State Park north of Orlando, it could easily be labeled as a bustling tourist attraction now while the second one, Lake Ella outside Tallahassee seemed to be a forgotten remnant of a more leisurely society long past.
So you be the judge about the photo selections I took below from our early afternoon walks during these two outings. Do you see those sparks of Monet interest that caught my attention on these two days? Note we will be moving west to New Orleans for a three day visit next on our road trip.
Do you prefer watching live sports at outdoor or indoor stadiums?
“Infield or outfield I see a verdant sea.Where memories are remade and dreams run free.The grass forms a stage where legend rules.In battles hard fought for victory’s jewels”
(USFMAN 2024)
It’s the 7th game of the 2016 World Series as my favorite team, the Cleveland Indians, have just overcome a 6-3 deficit in this deciding series finale to tie up the contest with the Chicago Cubs in the bottom of the 8th inning in dramatic home run fashion. With extra innings likely to happen soon afterward, game momentum now shifts in favor of “The Tribe.” All of a sudden, it begins to rain heavily on this natural grass expanse of Progressive Field. For seventeen emotionally gripping minutes, the baseball action now stops as both teams exit to their indoor dressing rooms to discuss their latest plans to win this pivotal contest. When play resumes in the top of this 10th inning, it’s soon evident that this weather slowdown has adversely quieted the spirited crowd atmosphere foreshadowing an end to the Indians game winning “edge.” For the new Indians pitcher inserted fresh out of the bullpen improbably gives up two runs in the top of this extra inning to shift odds in the outcome of this game to an eventual Cubs World Series win.
So should I blame the Indians loss on this ominous turn of events in this final game of sudden inclement weather appearing in this open air stadium? Probably it’s yes, many would reason. Yet if even if this is so, I’d never give in to any further explanation that an indoor stadium with climate controlled weather conditions would have provided a better place to play this tightly contested baseball event then.
Certainly I can see the advantages of playing baseball or most other sports for that matter in air conditioned comfort seemingly not impacted by passing storms and other uncomfortable weather conditions. But I consider it more vital to absorb the strong sensory experience of real grass, the sky above, and the unique panorama of history’s mark observed around the stadium surroundings as critical to the enjoyment of the live event itself. I might even call this phenomenon a form of self spectator hypnosis.
So leave those artificial sporting venues of modern convenience, particularly in baseball, to more appropriate forms of entertainment like rallies, concerts, and trade fairs. Furthermore, show respect for us “purist” fans who like to breathe, smell, and gaze curiously outside at sporting events offering natural surrounding’s throne. If you read this blog intently, I can tell that you now sense our keen desire to breathe again that fragrant cactus breeze and scan that mystical desert horizon while attending Arizona Spring Training baseball on our upcoming road trip.
For some creative fun, take a look at the wide range of Major League Baseball stadium backdrops functioning now around America by clicking on the link in the following video. Imagine which of these sports venues strike you as more appealing to watch a live game.
What are you most thinking most about on President’s Day?
“Facts do not cease to exist because they are ignored.” (Aldous Huxley)
As I celebrate another President’s Day on February 19 this year, I’m pursuing a vital task to find reputable studies that reveal objectively how all of our Presidents rank competitively against each other throughout history in doing their job. Let’s imagine then looking at this holiday effort in sports “Draft Day” fashion whereby a selection of one President would be made round by round to compose an All Star Presidential team. In particular, I’d be curious to know how our current leading candidates for President in 2024 (Biden and Trump) stand in this analytic setting.
So I’m excited to share the “Presidential Greatness Project Expert Survey” whereby experts have “crunched” key available data to complete this important ranking task. I also invite you to scan through the attached photos and decide for yourself who are our most and least deserving U.S. Presidents.
Do you believe in the idea of “Evolution” to explain the diversity of living things existing on earth? Why or why not?
“It’s not the strongest of the species that survive, nor the most intelligent, but the one most responsive to change?” (Charles Darwin)
Do you sometimes wonder how your dog or cat acts to master their required needs? For they might know more about how to get your attention or satisfy their hunger than you think! Such curiosity might help explain why I’m a huge believer in “evolutionary theory” or more commonly called “survival of the fittest” which rationally illustrates how and why life species’ expanded on this earth. To reinforce this conclusion, I consider the past works of renowned naturalist Charles Darwin, who pioneered the idea during his lengthy expedition throughout South America in the 1830s that living organisms must adapt physically or behaviorally to conditions in its environment in order to successfully survive.
The Darwin version of life’s evolution on earth, known as “Natural Selection” thus fueled further scientific support for the premise that life’s beginning on earth took place as single celled organisms once evolved over eons of time in an ancient sea.This theory would further support a connection between this process of biological life adaptation and genetic improvements in life matter as well, whereby, the emergence of more complex types of living things would have then taken place. Fish developed fins and learned to swim. Reptiles grew scales for protection. Wings emerged on birds for flight. Finally mammals evolved on land to grow legs to walk and use larger brains for more complex mental activity. In this ever changing earth, humans, too, eventually became a product of this adaptation process to survive in learning how to stay upright, work with tools, communicate through language, and maintain civilizations to live in.
Before proceeding further in the text of this blog entry, I invite you to observe for yourself “The Complete Library of Charles Darwin Works” concerning his “Theory of Evolution” and related topics in the link below.
Know then that I often enjoy visiting places on vacation where I can better understand how living things adapt to challenges in their natural environment in the manner of evolutionary thinking. On a global scale, I can, for instance, reflect back to our first African safari adventure along the open grasslands of Kenya where at times we witnessed the violent predatory behavior of lions, leopards, and crocodiles in their relentless pursuit of their prey. The cool Pacific coast shorelines of Morro Bay, California also immediately come to mind as a strong example of evolution’s work. For this terminus of so many of our westbound road trips sparks vivid memories of the conspicuous presence of sea gulls, cormorants, and pelicans as well as mammal species like squirrels, otters and seals in fierce competition for protective territory and feeding grounds nearest a towering rock monolith extending out into the ocean.
Taking this conversation a step further, I invite you to try identifying the evolutionary qualities exhibited by sloths and different kinds of “Great Ape” species in the following two videos below. To do so, pay particular attention then to how each of these creatures uses their physical body parts and natural acts of behavior to adapt themselves to environments where they live. So just click on each link below to access the videos and have some scientific fun.
What messages about American society do Super Bowl advertisements convey today?
“An idea in the highest sense of the word, cannot be conveyed but by a symbol.” (Samuel Taylor Coleridge)
The Super Bowl this year between the Kansas City Chiefs and San Francisco 49ers represents much more than crowning one of these team as the National Football League (NFL) champion. For it’s well known that millions of viewers who tune in to the game each year can be expected to find a plentiful supply of advertising commercials before, during, and after the game. Certainly these innovative and impactful marketing strategies of goods and services during the biggest professional football event provides strong entertainment value for the masses of people who watch them. But these “glitzy” brand presentations also place American contemporary issues in the forefront in order to foster a meaningful “buzz” of conversation concerning the need to consider political and societal change in the future.
So attached below you will notice a list of links of 2024 game advertisements to click on and watch for yourself followed by some persuasive messaging ideas that I conclude from each of them. Considering the importance of securing voter interest in this important election year, I encourage you to add your own perspectives about any of these ads in the comment section .
Our minds can distort our thinking so let us depend more on the latest technology to pave the way for clearly knowing in more detail about what we are seeing.
You never know when something miraculous will happen to change your life. Pay attention more to the immediate moment for small signs of self contentment.
It’s important for young children to compete to win in sports. Such serious athletic participation will help them adjust better to real life happenings as they get older..
Don’t panic in emergencies. We’ve already gone through times in the past when we relied most on self reliance, hard work, and closer family and friend connections.These tools for success in life still work when we attempt to handle the impersonal complexity of life now with artificial intelligence and other technological challenges.
Take control of your life. Pump yourself with up brute strength and “macho toughness” and you can win out in any challenge to your survival that you face.
We’re prone to forget our daily tasks if we strictly depend on our memory abilities to do them. So get more online savvy and your forgetfulness problems will be solved.
You are probably tired of shopping in crowded grocery store lines and congested drive thru windows outside your favorite restaurants. So free up more time for yourself with fast, home delivery service.
“I took a walk in the woods and came out taller than the trees.” (Henry David Thoreau)
Looking back to my previous life as a child in Northeast Ohio, I vividly recall enduring the frigid winter season after the December holidays each year. I simply could not understand in my youth being cooped up inside wondering why those inviting neighborhood forests containing deciduous specimens of oak, beech and maple trees would turn brown from leaf shed each year and seemingly die. For how could winter deny me the opportunity to climb up a sturdy tree trunk, play hide and seek behind them, or leap to retrieve freshly picked crab apples in the spirit of play?
Happily I now live in Fort Lauderdale, Florida where sunshine speads subtropical greenery bliss year around. So for those of you currently “caught up” in the wrath of winter, I offer an invitation for you to take an imaginary walk with me to obtain some personal tree understandings in my newest poem creation.
For added pleasure I include a link below to click on for exploring random sounds of various forest environs around the world as well as some inviting tree photos of my past Florida travels.
What former American President’s words most captures your attention in modern times now?
“Evil acts of the past are never rectified by evil acts of the present.” (Lyndon B. Johnson)
A young lawyer of twenty eight years old who’d recently moved from a small countryside village to a growing capitol city saw his first opportunity to act upon his passions. For he sensed the country was moving in the wrong direction and had decided to speak publicly about his concerns. So he chose to warn a gathering of young men at a debating society in Springfield, Illinois about the dangers of those who advocated slave whippings, lynchings and other forms of mob violence in a nation deeply divided by slavery. In doing so, he seemed willing to embrace this Lyceum movement which reached its peak during the antebellum era before the Civil War and was characterized by high interest in social and cultural reforms.
Know then it’s important for all Americans to seriously ponder the contemporary importance of Abraham Lincoln’ s words in this famous Lyceum Address delivered on January 27, 1838. For in this speech, he focused on the critical need to maintain our Democracy’s system of “checks and balances” in pursuit of lawful action and respect for human rights. How relevant these issues thus foreshadow what’s at stake in this country’s current political crisis now. For consider the consequences if a similarly ominous scenario of fractured ideals that happened during Lincoln’s time reappeared due to MAGA” takeovers with “Fascist” political intentions? Would such extremists obtain power to rule local, federal and state government operations uncontrollably at will? Would such new leaders thus be considered above the law? While under such conditions of tyranny’s presence, what groups of people would be persecuted with such fair and equal application of the law lacking?
I thus invite you to carefully read a one paragraph excerpt below from that historic talk which revealed Lincoln’s timely advice about what American Democracy should mean for “ALL” in future generations.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN’S LYCEUM SPEECH WORDS
“Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy -six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor;–let every man remember that to violate the law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character of his own, and his children’s liberty.”
So in this critical election time, a “trillion dollar” question emerges. Are Americans willing to preserve democracy in 2024 in the face of rising threats to our longstanding Constitutional framework? Click on the link below to obtain a more extensive discussion of this important topic. Take a look as well at some authentic newspaper clipping at the end of this blog which depict realistic scenes of slavery’s stain on American values from which Mr. Lincoln addressed about on that historic day.
What problems in America exist today requiring a societal re-awakening?
“Is human nature such that under certain conditions, stupidity can come to dominate, infecting the brighter quad rants, dragging everybody down with it.” (George Saunders)
I’ve never been to a Trump rally but from what I can tell, they represent the epitome of “Dummy Down” culture that so many of us realize now. Actually I’d be curious to witness one of these events in hope that I might find better ways to cope with such erratic crowd behavior to help our American Democracy stay intact.
So allow me to rant a bit below with some accompanying photos about some symptoms of our current societal malaise of “Dumminess” followed by some relevant scenarios from my travels that might help to reframe each of their solutions in a more uplifting manner. In doing so, I find historic inspiration from the intellect of Founding Father Benjamin Franklin, the patience of President Abraham Lincoln, the generosity of entertainer Oprah Winfrey, and the humanity of Dr. Martin Luther King.
1. Unhealthy Fast Food Invasion
I am well aware of the current crisis of Americans regarding their eating habits as it’s been well documented that a majority of adults in this country in recent years are either overweight or obese. Thus I’m perplexed about why so many customers in South Florida choose to wait in long drive-thru lines at popular fast venues like Chick – fil -A to purchase largely non-nutritious fast food. Such “quick fix” living to fill the belly with too many carbs inside one’s vehicle in isolation from others cries out for a reset of where and how we eat. So alternatively, I would imagine myself instead sitting leisurely along a Parisian cafe nibbling from my pistachio nut bowl and striking up a friendly chat with a stranger as a way to be headed in the right eating direction.
2. Idiocy Of Driving Behavior
When merging vehicles come to a four way stop, there’s always need for drivers to yield. But when impatient competition sets in for such people inviting them to be discourteous to others around them, the incidence of road rage confusion escalates. So under such converging vehicle intersection circumstances, I might imagine instead being threatened with a “pride” of hungry lions as I walk along the campfire during a Kenyan safari vacation where the inviting smells of my well cooked meat on the grill await be eaten. Either animal or human will have to yield to this immediate eating temptation to grab the tasty meal and it likely will be me !
3. Warlike Appeal Of Live Sports
As I attended a National Hockey League game last week, three, separate player fights broke out within the first minute of play. As the officials struggled to clear each melee, hordes of spectators in the packed house arena went wild with sheer happiness at being entertained by such brutality. A further escalation of raucous cheering from the crowd occurred as the involved fighting players were forced into the penalty box to serve their seemingly minimal five minute suspension. So for me to just enjoy hockey as a major sport, it, I’d alternatively resist such fits of raw violent emotion from players and attendees while embracing the sport for its masterful skill of gliding so gracefully along the ice to score. To do so I would think back to my attendance at British Premier Soccer contests , where I’d witnessed London Arsenal fans in London linking arms throughout the entire match whatever the score to rejoice in the celebratory ritual of singing in unison a favorite song.
4. Childhood Soccer Anger Misplaced
Young children from my past teaching experience thrive on finding natural ways to just have fun. So what sense does it make for parents to pressure them into competitive team sports like soccer in neighborhood parks at such an early age to defeat their opponent at all cost? What happens to their fragile self esteem when they lose? For I would think of my child win or lose then as a bicycle rider in the “Le Tour de France” amid ALL participants who’ve completed this arduous endeavor and are welcomed back at the race finish by the crowd in an enthusiastically joyous manner.
5. “AI” (Artificial Intelligence) Gone Haywire
I played an app version of Geography Wordle last week and noticed a Chatbot message via “AI” offering to write me a story, song, or poem in a mere moment of time. So without any literary effort on my part, I could easily then post on social media… something unoriginal for all to see on any subject I desire. Know then from my past grading standards as a writing professor, such an easy version of writing submitted by a student who depended on AI would raise a “red flag” for me as intolerably wrong from a plagiarism perspective. I thus would find good reason under these false writing circumstances to assign a failing grade. Thinking more deeply about how to remedy any thoughts of such technology over-dependence in such a situation, I’d picture myself driving blindly through the torrid heat and sand blown conditions of the Mojave Desert in California without benefit of “GPS” vehicle guidance or functional map directions. Instead using strictly my own spatial abilities and predictive intuition as a guide, how might I figure out my own ways to drive out of this landscape mess?
Snippets of a Traveling Mind 
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