At Random: In Defense of Worrying

By Paul Clark
(aka motomynd)

Worry is thought by some to be avoided, an unhealthy stress. But I consider worrying and plain old thinking to be basically interchangeable terms. In most cases, thinking instead of ignoring is the first step toward taking action, and worrying is second-level thinking, taking a further step toward action.
    I find the more I worry about something instead of “just thinking” about it, the more likely I am to do whatever I can to help whatever cause.
    For example, in the case of worrying about people in this country who are likely to attempt an autocratic takeover, DeSantis and Trump top my list. What I’m doing about this might be the subject of another column. Or not.

Copyright © 2023 by Paul Clark

Moristotle 80th Birthday Interview

Interviewed by Geoffrey Dean

I posed a number of probing questions to Moristotle recently. His answers give us new insights into his mind and heart, while on a lighter note, they also helped me figure out what to give him for his 80^th birthday tomorrow!

     Thanks to my sister, Jennifer, for taking the photos above.

What three (or more) words would you use to describe yourself?

Skeptical, optimistic, helpful. I’m surprised how easily those three words came, and how confident I am of them….No, those came too fast; they need qualification, elaboration.

Goines On: Raging

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Goines’ bedtime thoughts for two nights were topsy-turvy and frustrating, owing mainly to his inability to hold intermediary thoughts in short-term memory.

    “Frustrating” hardly captured it. During the second night (after the incident of the empty sheriff’s car with its engine running) he groggily thought he had pieced together the characteristics of the 2200 bumped cycle, but he wasn’t sure, because it apparently wasn’t 40 years long (like the 2100 bump). 

    The morning after that second night, now awake and able to jot done stuff, he went over (and over) his nighttime finding for the 2200 bumped cycle and found that it was 28 years long, which seemed odd, because that was the same number of years as the standard 28-year cycle. Goines slogged on to the end of the 2001–2400 calendar period, taking notes as he went.

Goines On: 2021 or 2001?

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Goines thought he should first explain to the prospective 12-year-old programming whiz that his personal mnemonic

        “Mi Ki Ko Ranch” rattles Miquel

had been chosen for practical reasons, because it represented Goines’ present year, 2021. The kid might think it made more sense for a program to use the year 2001 – it seemed cleaner somehow... unless he or she chose to use 2021 as a way of attributing Goines – which Goines would have to agree would be nice.

Goines On: The bumps

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Over several days, Goines further cogitated the “bump problem” that arose when a 00 non-leap year came along and interrupted the standard 28-year cycle, with its pattern of 6₁-11-6₂-5 sub-cycles. He believed he could specify a pattern for the 400-year stretches as well, each one comprising three 00-years that aren’t leap years.
    He had already traced the 6₁-11-6₂-5 sub-cycles back to 1909, within 8 years of the 1900 non-leap year, and up to 2099, where the 6₁-11-6₂ portion of 28-year cycle butted up against the 2100 non-leap year. He now needed to examine that bump at 2100, and the bumps at 2200 & 2300 as well.

Goines On: Before 1901, after 2099?

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Goines looked at his archives and discovered that he had years ago pieced together more about calendar recycling than he was currently re-piecing together. He had tackled the subject in some depth eight years earlier, even written a sestina about it for the Goineses’ 47^th wedding anniversary.
    While he didn’t think he still had the brain power those earlier investigations required, he was pleased that he was managing to re-tool a thing or two for his “parlor trick.”

Goines On: Shortcut to 1976

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The night following Goines’ successful experiments with shifting to past years from the 2021 calendar, his thoughts were troubled. Why was he even thinking about this? What did it gain him – or anyone else? As a painter had said to him when he touted his calendar mnemonic to her, “Just consult a calendar for the year in question!”
    And anyway, when did anyone even need to know what day of the week a date in some other year fell on? Wasn’t this mnemonic thing just a parlor trick? Poets – like that painter who hadn’t been impressed – concerned themselves with trees and flowers, light and shade, human and geological history, man’s failings and successes, life and death. 

Goines On: Those elusive leap years

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In the few days remaining before their flight to California, Goines wondered whether the solution to the problem of calculating the day of the week for dates in past or future years might be a lot simpler than he had been imagining. What if he just used his mnemonic for the current year (“Mi Ki Ko Ranch” rattles Miquel) and then “shifted” to the year of the date in question?
    The calendar for next year varies from this year’s calendar by starting either 1 day or 2 days later in January, depending on whether this year is, or is not, a leap year (2021 is not). Leap years have 366 days, or 35 weeks plus 2 days. Last year’s calendar starts a day or two earlier in the week for the same reasons. Goines wasn’t going to solve this before they left, so he tried to stop thinking about it and finish packing.

Goines On: Stress junkie

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Goines told Bic he needed to finish the flyer that he was helping Bic with because the Goineses were going out of town for a week. Bic told him not to “stress himself” – if he didn’t finish before they left, it was okay. But the phrase brought Goines the realization that he wanted to get the job done before they left. Bic had just triggered the insight that when it comes to positive, creative stress, Goines was a junkie. He loved creative stress, he needed it!

Goines On: Pregnant with possibility

By Moristotle

[Author’s Note: Allusions in this vignette to other Goines vignettes are not acknowledged. My intention is that the vignettes, artfully collected and arranged, might someday be published as a book, a sort of “portrait in a thousand strokes.”]

The sky ahead of Goines was vast and cloudless as he merged onto the freeway to go to an ophthalmology appointment. He felt strong, he felt good, enjoying the sky, the feeling. He felt as though there were many possibilities for him out there in that expanse of world and time, and though he knew he wouldn’t, he wanted to live forever.

Whatever Happened to Critical Thinking?

By Dr. Ely Lazar & Dr. Adele Thomas

[Republished here by permission of the authors from their “Lifestyle Tips For Over 50s”]

Socrates said: “Whatever authority I may have rested solely on knowing how little I know.” The statement reflected the fact that he had contempt for the knowledge displayed by authorities. He recognised 2,500 years ago that mindless subservience to authority did not serve people well. It appears that Socrates detected a lack of critical thinking on the part of many individuals. Fast forward to today, and we have to acknowledge that many are devoid of logic.