Lars and the Real Girl

I finally watched this movie. A friend told me about it when it first arrived in theaters. It seems like a movie we should see once a month so we can remember that people can help each other to get where they need to be. Of course, it is unrealistic and is that not too bad?

reCaptcha

Carnegie Mellon University has provided a free CAPTCHA service that will help to digitize old books, newspapers, and radio shows. A Captcha is a program (software) that enables us to login or to post messages in social networking programs on the internet.. you type into a little box several times a day in all liklihood. You are a human and you can figure out what the word or sequence of letters are, but some mischievious program out on the internet cannot. A Captcha distinquishes a human from a non-human bot on the internet. ( If you took certain math or computer courses or just read, you might remember the Turing test. Think how this connects.)

A reCaptcha is enabling those of us who type these words in (about 200 million per day) to help in the digitizing of the world's books etc. I thought this was a really nice cooperative effort.. we get into the website and we translate at the same time. Now last night I found out not all people like this. They think we are working for nothing. Nevermind that someone else has scanned the books. Carnegie Mellon has provided the software free of charge. In all liklihood we will have free access to the materials once digitized accurately also (think about the Internet Public Library). At any rate, I thought I would throw this out to see what people think if anyone ever reads this blog.

Millions of people let grid computing projects use the extra cycles on their computer and these projects are attempting to solve some very big problems. One of my computers worked on protein sequencing. Lots of people's computers work on SETI. Some search for prime numbers. It seems to be these are wonderful cooperative uses of cycles that would be wasted while we are up getting a drink of water.

Evidently not all people thing that way. Wow, I was completely disappointed to learn that people purposefully mistranslate the word intended for decoding something in a book we may want to read.

The Reluctant Fundamentalist

This book by Mohsin Hamid has a very interesting schema for telling the story. A Princeton educated Pakistani returns to Pakistan, meets an American in Old Anarkari. He says he will be of service as surely the American is searching for the perfect cup of tea. Off they go to the tea house where the story unfolds. I think of this as a serious Pakistani Bob Newhart. Hear one voice, but you know all this is being said or surmised.

We need to read more stories that provide us with some other ways of thinking as this book does. I find it interesting though that Hamid lives in London and not Lahore!

Good, fast read because you cannot put this beautifully written book aside.

Virginia Woolf and the Brain

This is one interesting story that was on Weekend Edition Saturday on August 2. If you have read Virginia Woolf you may be interested in this story about art and science.

The photo is from Barcelona. I just find it interesting.

Friend's web site

Like poetry? Try reading something new. One of my high school and actually, college, friends has a website where he posts his poetry and more. http://www.cebulski.net/

We both attended the University of Colorado (when there was only one main campus and thus, just known as CU. Now it is UCB.) We had but one class together, a senior level literature class. The lowly math major sat in this class with all these brainy literature majors. I remember one fellow who could tell us all about the music in Ulysses. I sat in awe, but it was fun and I was glad I escaped with a B. I even wrote what I considered an interesting paper. I wonder if I would now.

In that class in addition to Ulysses by James Joyce, we read Passage to India, Mrs. Dalloway, Sons and Lovers, and a few other books, plus one separate book of our own choosing for the paper. I will find my notebook and remind myself what else we read. I am glad I can remember each of those books and, especially, those authors. It was really good class and definitely different from my math classes.

Interestingly, I still read quite a few books, but rarely prove anything mathematically. I do still help kids with math, however, and I love mathematical and logic puzzles, as well as, reading Clifford Pickover and Martin Gardner. I have to add that without the math degree, I would never have worked at NBS and learned to program computers. Who would have thought in 1958 that the first home computer I had would be as powerful as the one I used to program a gigantic book of Microwave Spectral Tables and other scientific endeavors such as the velocity of light as determined by several experimental setups.

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle

Oh, oh.. this book is a must read for those who like dogs or who like modern versions of Shakespeare's plays. I don't know how many of these novels have been written, but surely this one sets the bar a little higher. The other book based on a Shakespearian play moved to modern times is A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley. It is an older book and also worth reading.

The Story of Edgar Sawtelle will make you cry and occasionally laugh, but you have to keep reading, day and night, until the book is done. Almondine is as much a character as anyone else in the book. You will marvel at how Wroblewski can write about dogs and how a dog thinks and feels. Each dog in Edgar's litter, that he has been given to raise and train, has a personality and each is different.

This book took ten years to write and I believe it. It is so well done. The author, David Wroblewski, writes software for his day job, but maybe he will give it up and write more novels.

This is a lily from the north side of my house

Summer Books

I don't know why I don't update this blog more often. I could be taking my book notes right here. Well, that might be boring to others. I read the book that a local high school is using for its all school read this fall. The book is Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls. The book is an easy read, as they say, and the story is gripping. There is so much to discuss in this book. I hope all the students and faculty read it and that they will have a great time the first few days discussing this book while they are waiting to come up to snuff in the various classes. What a grand idea.

I also finished Randy Pausch's Last Lecture book. It is small book, but lovingly written and it offers some simple advice for living. Mostly Have Fun.

The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao is well-written. You can certainly get an education about the Dominican Republic by studying the foot notes and looking up some of the history yourself. Why are there such evil people in the world and why do so many become leaders of small countries? When you figure it out, leave a message for me.

So many good books are out there and there is so little time to read each and everyone.

Fall Activities

Gosh, I should write for this blog a little more often. I walked the Crop Walk in October. It was fun because I talked the whole time with two different people and we had some great discussions. It was also hard on the feet. On the other hand, many people walk that far everyday for water or food or for both so what is one day? Sometimes those people are children, missing school to get water or food. I think my church raised over $20,000 this year. We work pretty hard to raise funds at our church because we want Greensboro to raise a lot of money to feed the hungry here in our city and in other places where needed. One of our best fund raisers walks with a walker that she pushes as she has muscular dystrophy. She walks to ask people to contribute and then on the day of the walk. Pam is a very smiley person and wants so much to help. She raised over $1000. The young lady in the orange hat is one of my Godchildren. The other two are her siblings and all are grandchildren of very good friends of mine.

Spring the second time this year.

Spring is happening in Greensboro for the second time since December. Amazingly my quince in the back yard bloomed in December, never really lost the color and continues to bloom now. I hope that does not wear the bush out. This street is full of daffodils. Next fall, I plan to add more color to the front yard. I had plans to include pictures here, but it is taking forever to upload so they will have to wait for an edit.

My book group just read A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson. It is one remarkable book I think. Bryson tells of his personal experience walking the Appalachian Trail, but also throws in information such as the National Forest Service being one of the biggest road builders in the world, a wonderful description on the pumping capacity of trees. Right now in Greensboro, on this side of town, we remain in shock at a beautiful line of oak trees on the fringe of Friendly Shopping Center that were whacked off about four feet from the base (probably they will be totally gone the next time I get by). Why oh why is there so little regard for trees? We have a tree ordinance and an urban arborist, but nothing has power over those who choose to whack down trees. I will take a picture when I go there next. Doesn't anyone memorize Trees by Joyce Kilmer these days?

Lighted Christmas Balls in Sunset Hills

Our neighborhood is well lit these days with hundreds of chicken wire lighted Christmas balls in the oak and other trees. It is very hard to take pictures of the lights. Here is a relative closeup of three (look carefully and you will see the blue ball on the left and up from the red ball) just as it is getting dark. I timed the traffic tonight and there are 30 cars per minute. Ours is not the only street that is well lit so I expect others are seeing traffic increases also. We have written instructions if anyone needs the PDF file. For more pictures see www.lightedchristmasballs.blogspot.com. I wonder what the neighborhood looks like from above.

The Day after the Crop Walk

I did it. I walked. My left knee did not like it, but I finished, came home and iced my knee. Thanks to all who supported my walk. It looks as though Greensboro did better than last year, but we still can't catch Charlotte! Still three NC cities lead the country in raising money: Charlotte, Durham, and Greensboro. We walk so other people can eat.

Crop Walk

Hello Friends,
I will be walking on October 8 in Greensboro's Crop Walk. Greensboro has the second or third largest Crop Walk in the country and we are striving to be number one. If you would like to walk, please send me email at mrpratto@acm.org. Please use subject Crop Walk.

My friends Jonathan and Ann Smith are sponsoring my walk in memory of two dear people. Hang Kpa, a little Montegnard refugee died this week of a brain stem glioma. She was five years old. (Please pray for her family). Dear David Pratto graduated from life on earth in October 2002. He had an inoperable brain tumor. Thank you to Ann and Jonathan.

Other sweet friends are sponsoring my walk also, the Knoxes, Ms. Penny, my children, Ms. Jeffus, my mom, Ms. Lautermilch, the Hermans, Ms. Capone, the Kellys and the Buschs. Thanks to all for feeding people in Greensboro and around the world.

Reminder

Current events are reminding me of this poem. Perhaps events do not remind you of this poem, but the poem is worth reading anyway. I am including the link to what is supposed to be the original (in German) and then some translations. First they came..

When teaching high school religion classes, almost 40 years ago, we used these passages with a wonderful film strip to kick off a discussion with high school students.

Central Wildcats 1956

Via request, I have created a blog for our high school class from Pueblo Central 1956. I am still working on inviting people with email addresses to become members of the blog. It will take awhile since I have to do them three at a time by copying and pasting the email addresses from my address book to the invitation page of the blog.

At any rate, check it out. http://wildcats56.blogspot.com

Nice to help when you can

I get lots of email and I don't want to pick out any individuals nor any specific emails (mostly forwarded messages written by some unknown person). However, I would like to respond to a large group of persons that perpetuate mail that is not friendly to others of those among us. There is an old saying, "It is better to light a candle, than to curse the darkness." So when you wish to complain about one group or another in the US, your town, my town, the world etc, consider doing some volunteer work and helping someone.

Mario in Japan and Central 1956 in Pueblo

I just read part of Mario from Greensboro's blog. Mario is teaching in Japan and you might find his diary about Japan and his photos of Japan very interesting. The blog is marioinjapan.blogspot.com. Check it out.


I think of going to the internet first for information so if I suddenly or not so suddenly remembered that I graduated from Central 50 years ago this year, I would start hunting for information about a class reunion. SO, in case anyone else does the same thing, we are having a class reunion September 8,9,10. Send me email (mrpratto@acm.org) and I will put you in contact with the reservation maker. But you can send me your biography so I can finish the bio book before I leave for Italy the end of June. So far this has been a fun endeavor, but also time consuming. If any classmates are out there with some great old photos, please send them.

sex kittens and horn dawgs fall in love, part 3

Remember I said this was a totally "darling" and cute book and just a sweet book for teens to read. Well, the book is supposed to be banned in one school in Central Florida. I can't believe it. This book is just so nice, such good kids, trying to learn about love in a very positive way, and trying to do good things. Those who would have it banned, have not even read the book.

The author has posted the links to the St. Petersburg Times on her blog: www.maryrosewood.com. Check it out and then I hope you will read this book so you too can know to what low depths the world has sunk.

My granddaughter, who read the book, said it is akin to the Princess Diaries in "niceness". Another book on the list is one I just gave to my then 10 year old grandson! I read the books before I give them which is more than I can say about would-be book banners.

Free Reading, Listening, Viewing

Free reading, listening, and viewing on the Internet.

Yesterday our local newspaper ran an article on free or near free sources on the Internet. I thought I would key them in once so other people can find them and add one of my favorites, missed by the article author. A really interesting site for those without sight is www.librivox.org. At this site you can get books for listening or volunteer to read for others.

Good old Wiki has two places where you may find interesting or necessary material. The first has books, speeches, essays etc by people you may want to reference sometime (especially for students!). Wiki also has books in several languages. Now you can read some books as originally written.

The Internet is a great archive and now there is a site dedicated to archiving of interesting items such as old cartoons, feature films etc. Go check it out.

Of course there is the famous Project Guttenberg. Go get yourself a classic to read today or this week or whenever. There are only 17,000 items to choose from, including the book I tortured by book group into reading once, Ulysses by James Joyce. My suggestions are now taken with a large grain of salt.

The author left out the Internet Public Library, but it has books for various age levels and displays just as if you walked into a library.

So if you are homebound or just curious or you just have to look at something new today, try these places. Oh, if you have a young person around, note there is not an excuse for getting to the library for a book, but do keep an extra ream of paper on hand if that person has to read on paper!

sex kittens and horn dawgs fall in love, part 2

I edited my review of Sex Kittens and Horn Dawgs Fall in Love because I finished the book a long time ago and I had not updated. So go back to my late January post and read some more. The book is really cool and fun to read. My granddaughter liked it. Maryrose Wood's second book will be out in May so you should read this one now.

The picture on the left is my little dog, Prima, one of the cuter dogs in the universe. She doesn't consider herself a dog though, except when she is out walking.