Ray Woodcock’s Current Thoughts

In this game, you sit in a circle and take turns.  The first person says, “I bet that, since this game started, someone in this circle has had the thought that they hope they will win the game.”  Everyone in the circle who has had this thought raises his/her hand, gets a point, takes a drink, or whatever.  If no hands go up, then the speaker loses a point, takes a drink, sheds a piece of clothing, or whatever.  You go around the circle, each person betting that they know of a thought that at least one person in the circle has had since the game started.  You play until someone reaches the winning score (10 points, maybe, or 21), or whatever.

Then you start back at the first person and ask him/her to repeat the thing that s/he bet first.  In the example just given, the first person would say to the winning person, “OK, John, I bet that someone in the group had the thought that they hoped they would win.  You raised your hand.”  Then the next person for whom John raised his hand would repeat the bet that s/he had made.  You go around the circle until you’ve repeated all of the bets that John raised his hand for.

Now John has to describe the thoughts he had, in response to each of the bets, and explain how one thought led to the next, or provide other details about the thoughts he claimed to have.  Then people in the circle vote on whether his story is believable.  If they think he’s fibbing, he loses his winner status, or gives up his points, or is out of the circle, or whatever.

After Thanksgiving Thursday.

I’ve been chuckling, for years, at Leno’s & Letterman’s jokes at the expense of Hillary Clinton — about pantsuits and frigidity and all that.  But in reality, as I view the person she has turned out to be, I think she’s a consummate actress.  I don’t say that critically or disparagingly.  I mean to say she has the face and demeanor of someone who could turn in a compelling performance on film.

If she doesn’t wind up as vice president, she won’t be a major force in the Senate.  She doesn’t have enough seniority or, apparently, enough friends there for that.  There’s even a risk she will lose re-election; that happens, sometimes, to those who reach for the stars and fail.  I hate to see someone with her talents (and even with her ability to stir up controversy) simply wither away.  She’s had a remarkable run so far, as former first ladies go; why stop now?

At the end of World War II, western troops faced off against Soviet troops across central Europe.  The result was an Iron Curtain that partitioned the Continent.

I visited Berlin in 1988.  West Berlin was a rich city, surrounded by East Berlin and East Germany.  It was an island of prosperity and freedom within a sea of repression and backwardness.  The U.S. and its allies made sure of it.  West Berlin was a beacon of what the whole of Germany could be, and of what it would become.

Israel and the Palestinians look likely to continue beating the hell out of each other until further notice.  While that trench warfare continues, the more strategic emphasis is upon the cultural bridge to the Middle East that exists and/or can exist in Amman and, conceivably, in a future, liberated Egypt and a future, demilitarized Beirut.

Unlike Berlin, however, that “best of the West” image should be predominantly freedom- rather than wealth-oriented.  Money is not going to impress Middle Easterners who already look askance at the rich emirates to their south.  What is more likely to impress them is religious and cultural freedom and tolerance, nurtured over a period of several decades.  As the saying goes, that which is important is seldom urgent, and (as we may belatedly learn, in our perennial efforts to achieve a frontal solution in Palestine) that which is urgent is seldom important.

I have a copy of a book.  I would rather have it in PDF format so I can search it for specific terms and store it electronically.  So I rip it apart and I scan it.  Later, I’m done with it.  I sell or donate it to the Internet Library Circulation Department (ILCD) by sending it by e-mail or on CD.

At this point, my rights in the book cease, just as if I had sold or donated a physical book.  The ILCD could be set up to verify that my copy of the PDF had indeed been equipped with a neutering tag, rendering it unopenable.

The copy at the ILCD would be available to other borrowers, just like a real book.  While it was in use by one borrower, it would not be available to others.  The electronic versino becomes the complete replacement for the physical version.

There should be an ad for a motorscooter, Segway, skateboard, or some other transportation device that uses the Talking Heads’ song, “Psychokiller.”  Not that it’s a great song to sell products, except maybe if you’re in an extreme sports kind of mindset.  Being of a somewhat green orientation, I would suggest the “cycle” that is supposedly done in by the advertised product should be a motorcycle, not a bicycle.