BITS & PIECES OF A MISPLACED LIFE

 
  
 THINKING
  
 "Words do not seem to play any role in my 
mechanism of thought. I seem to use more or 
less clear images of a visual type, combined 
with some muscular feeling. These vaguely play 
together, combining with each other, without 
any logical construction in words and signs 
which could be communicated to others."
                    ALBERT EINSTEIN
  

 
 **
 Men don’t care what’s on TV. They only care 
what else is on TV. 
 Jerry Seinfeld
  
 That is how the mind of a top-flight comedian
 works. My mind when, at odd moments, it 
 thinks does not think like that. Most of the
 time my thoughts are in free fall, the larger
 parachute called ideas rarely opens. For
 example, when I was in college I enjoyed 
thinking about naked women. I still do, but 
now I wonder how different my life would be 
if the Philosophy Department had changed its 
name to THINKING ABOUT NAKED PEOPLE just how 
successful that Major would have been. I cannot 
think of any Student I knew not signing up for 
it. The Chair of the Department would soon be 
paid more than the football coaches. Philosophy 
teachers would be needed by the dozens. Final 
exams would be fun to take, and our nation’s 
low opinion about critical thinking would 
change overnight.
                      LJP
**
  
  
   

  MOVIE WISDOM
 
 "When a man is wrestling a leopard in the middle 
of a pond, he is in no position to run."
  
 Cary Grant's character in the classic screwball 
comedy directed by Howard Hawks --"Bringing Up 
Baby”


**
 I recall going to the Roxy when the Duke Ellington 
band was there, and when the film ended and the 
orchestra rose out of the pit playing “Take the 
A Train," the top of my head blew off. From then 
on, any movie set in New York had me.

  Woody Allen. Apropos of Nothing. 
 --
  **

SCI-FI

 Bruce Weber of The New York Times (December 6, 
2008)  began the obituary of this man with the 
following:

     It’s a common claim that someone is the world’s 
biggest fan of such-and such. Elizabeth Taylor’s 
biggest fan . The biggest fan of the New York’s Jets. 
The world’s Biggest country music fan.  Hardly anyone 
takes such a designation  seriously, except perhaps 
when it comes to _________   ________, whose 
obsessive  devotion to science fiction and horror 
stories was so fierce that he helped propel their
 popularity. Indeed, he was widely credited with 
  coining the term sci-fi.
  
  
 Can you identify the man who coined the term sci-fi?
  
 
 Forrest J Ackerman. According to Bruce Weber:  
“Mr. Ackerman said he came up with ‘sci-fi’ in 
1954. He was driving in a car with his wife 
when he  heard a radio announcer say ‘Hi-fi.’ 
he term, sci-fi just came reflexively and 
unbidden out of his mouth.
   **
 
  
THE POLITICAL SCIENCE FINAL EXAM
 
 Please answer the essay question in the blue 
book provided. 
 
  In October 2020, Televangelist Pat Robertson 
announced that  God told him that Donald Trump
 would win the Presidential election.  Why did
 God lie to Pat Robertson? 

**

Dear Editors:

  I beg to differ with the New York Times headline
 that refers to Marjorie Taylor Greene's destructive fantasies as "remarks". Gertrude Stein remarked
 that  "Remarks are not literature," but hate speech 
is not a casual remark. Free speech is one issue
so many Trump-driven supporters do not understand. 
calling for Nancy Pelosi to be killed or accusing 
Jewish persons of starting forest fires with lasers 
from a distant planet is the equivalent to yelling 
"fire" in a crowded theater. Using "free speech" 
as a catch-all to spread false narratives and to
express disdain for truth and scientific fact 
creates a poisonous environment that kills freedom, 
drains the oxygen from the air that true speech 
needs to thrive in. Not all speech is equal,
nor is all speech free. Words can kill.  

Sincerely,

Louis Phillips


**
AS IF ONE COULD LIVE ON LIGHT ALONE
  
 The moon with its bad eye
 Is a midnight feast.
 Why are so many of us 
 Dining at the wrong table? 
**

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