April 1974---The Blast Heard Around Major League Baseball That Marked A Major Milestone in African American History That Was Better Than The Feats of Jackie Robinson—But I Was Unable To Recall at Age 3

          Well, this Major League Baseball player was probably inspired by the feats of Jackie Robinson, and was born to hit dinger after dinger in the milieu of professional baseball, even on the day of April 10^th  1974, where not even death threats against him can keep him from achieving one of the greatest milestones in this national pastime sport.

          

       As I saw TV pictures of what I do not remember at 3 years old, here is this guy in an Atlanta Braves uniform of white and dark blue with a blue cap, and I see that the field is awash in bright light (so hence it was a nighttime game), facing off against Al Downing of the Los Angeles Dodgers. Al throws a pitch that he can hit, probably a center-cut fast ball that was about to sink a little bit below the zone, and I see this batter connect perfectly with a loud crack, and I knew that ball was going to be out of there…in several seconds. I then see the Dodger left fielder run towards the left field wall, even though I do not know his name (but not until after digging that this player turned out to be Bill Buckner, who would also play for the Cubs). I also see that some of the employees of the left-field bullpen as well as the players were trying to vie for supremacy to try to catch history—the famous home-run ball. The left-fielder then scales up to the fence to try to catch the ball, outstretching one of his glove hands but I saw that the ball was out of his reach and landed into the bullpen area, and I hear the roar of the crowd. The loudest roar ever in a stadium known at that year as Turner Field.

         As soon as this guy makes his home run trot towards second base, he is mobbed by 
some several strangers and then I hear something like cannons going off in honor of his 
milestone dinger—which was actually aerial pyrotechnic salutes (probably 35-40 shots 
of them in 30 seconds) blowing up above the stadium—which almost reminded me of 
similar explosions inspired by the Oakland A’s president, Charles Finley, for his Alameda
 County Coliseum for his baseball team. (He would have liked those explosions anyway 
because those explosions were used when the A’s got the 1973 World Series title.)  
Then as he gets mobbed again by the Braves players who greeted him with hugs and celebratory jumps and handshakes (the pyro ends at that point), and then, I see the crowd in the stands basking in one of the greatest feats they had ever saw—Babe Ruth’s record 714 career homers was ruptured for good, and this new man, who one radio broadcaster, Milo Hamilton (1927-2015), who recently died, exclaimed

“We have a new home-run king!”. Then I heard Vin Scully take a chance on that home-run call, making it simple, saying “Going, going, going, [and] it’s gone!”

and he stops speaking to let the TV viewers bask in the celebratory melee—the mobbing, the pyro exploding, and the fans cheering for this guy who had the famous nickname—“The Hank”. 

Who was that guy? That guy was no other than Hank Aaron.

           

Suppose I Were at the Pulse Nightclub and an Active Shooter is In My Vicinity--Thinking of the A.L.I.C.E. Method

Yes, there is the "run, hide, fight" technique for surviving active shootings. But there is another type of way to survive such horrible things like what happened in Orlando on June 12, 2016.

It is A.L.I.C.E. The letters in this acronym break down just like this:

A - Alert
L - Locdown
I - Identify
C - Counter
E - Evacuate

I heard about stories about people trying to survive or avoid being shot in the bathroom stall at The Pulse when the shooting rang out. Some decided to wait it out, some hid, at least one played dead. The good news was that since there were a litany of past active shootings in the USA, those in the Pulse did all they could to survive even though the body count was massive--50 dead, but it was better than 300 dead.

So even though the shooting had resulted in high casualties, I think at least there were some patrons at The Pulse who did as much as they could to outsmart the shooter before that shooter could kill or maim a lot, lot more people.

Probably the worst active shooting incident in America - worse than Columbine, worse than Sandy Hook, and worse than the Laurie Dann shooting that killed Nicholas Corwin in the 1980s.

What would I do if I were in the Pulse and decided to hide in the bathroom when the shots fired? Here is what I would do to stay alive.

Assuming a shooter will come in the bathroom to look for people to simply shoot or kill, and learning about the A.L.I.C.E. method I saw on a Youtube video (one method to survive a mass shooting), the way I do the crouching position and closing the bathroom door to the stall would be the L, or "lockdown" (basically hiding). If I hear cocking sounds, I know trouble is coming, that's the "I" (Identify - in this case, the shooter is in my vicinity). If the shooter was an extreme lunatic, he would probably fire through the bathroom stall door; if that is so, I would go down (assuming he will fire more shots) and move under through the privacy wall of the stall because if I just hid there, I would not even stand a chance. So.....

I would have to be absolutely still and quiet, and learning about cover and concealment options in the stall, I assess that I may not have 100 percent protection against bullets. I would have to go up to the toilet with my feet so that way my legs would not give away my location, and I have to crouch myself so that way my head also does not give away my location--because being shot in the head of course, means a quick death for me; being shot in the legs--I will get hurt but at least I may still have a chance to do C (or "counter")--do a forcible entry (push the door towards the shooter) by surprise and go for the shooter's groin,with an elbow strike, and then I do E (or "evacuate"). I may have a better advantage if I hear the clip dropping to the floor--and I could do C ("counter") again and I can do E ("evacuate")...run away before the shooter reloads one's clip to fire again.

 

Playing dead? I would do that as a sort of lockdown and counter (that is L and C) method but to make it seem real, I would have to put stage blood on my back of the neck, and the center of the back, if I have it with me, and put my head into the toilet and be absolutely still. If I do not have stage blood with me, I can use tomato ketchup and smear it in the same locations. I might even smear it on my hands to look like I had been shot multiple times. I would remain absolutely still and wait for the shooter to open the door and feel the butt of the gun of the shooter at my head as the shooter probes to make sure I am dead - and quickly, I would use the new C (counter)--go down and try to trip the shooter's legs to knock him off balance, and make my escape very quickly. 

 

So with that in mind, I may have to do it in the next time I go clubbing to dance--whether it is a salsa party, or a rave party, or a techno party--especially at a large club. So when the "BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG BANG" happens all of a sudden, and even if I do not see the shooter opening fire, I will know what to do--TO STAY ALIVE!!!

Well, Unlike Las Vegas in 1993, Chicago is Not The Place Where Buildings Used By The Mob are Blown Up—Like What Happened to the Dunes Hotel in Las Vegas

  The only time that a televised explosion involving the Chicago area and involving some type of
mob influence on a single building was in the late 1980s, called The Opening of Al Capone’s Vaults,
hosted by breakthrough Hispanic reporter that I used to love, Geraldo Rivera.
       Yes, there were explosions in Chicago in the past that were major. Comiskey Park had its
“exploding scoreboard” (and I felt the brunt of that in at least a few Chicago White Sox baseball
games I attended), the modern Navy Pier has its own summer lakefront fireworks, and of course
there was Disco Demolition in 1979. In addition to that, the FALN in the 1980s bombed Chicago, and way before that act happened, Chicago had its first terroristic incident in history way in the past with the anarchist dynamite bomb that blew up in the vicinity of Haymarket Square during a labor
protest there, killing scores of police officers and wounding a fair amount of others. But I was glad
that Chicago is not known as the “implosion capital of the world.”
         Las Vegas—thank God I was not living or planning to be there—was regrettably the “implosion
capital of the world.” Several rat-pack hotels in that city were already blown away to rubble—the
Tropicana—the Dunes II, and the Hacienda. Then, I found out quite too fast that the Dunes Hotel
was going to be dust. I saw the fireballs exploding around the hotel---several big ones---that I never
had seen in the past news pictures of a building implosion ever since. I was guessing that Las Vegas
did already claim the title as The Entertainment Capital of the World---they can do anything. Including imploding!
         But I did not know how they did the fireballs that enveloped the whole hotel into a reminder
of the most famous classic disaster moving, The Towering Inferno—for several seconds, before the
whole building finally game down. I learned later that it was hundreds of pounds of aviation fuel
rigged by explosion that caused the fires so spectacularly—and I had to figure out how all of this started coming down.
          I did not even know that there were 5 to 6 minutes of pyrotechnics in the sky around the whole
hotel in a pre-implosion display. And then, the first explosions started not at the Dunes Hotel itself—
the implosion started from the nearby Treasure Island hotel, at its famous stunt show area where there
are explosions and fire in the famous sea battle stunt scenes, and I heard the command of “Ready,
Aim, Fire!!!”, and I knew the implosion would actually start with a cannon shot from Treasure Island---and even though I could not identify the exact person who gave the command to “fire!” to start the implosions, I knew it was going to be a really explosive sight. And it was, but thank God I was not at Las Vegas to see it. It was going to be so bad for my ears and I would even pass out from either a panic attack or a heart attack if I saw the implosion live.
         I was trying to dig deep on why the Dunes had to go. First of all, I learned that they were shooting a movie where one hotel was supposed to be imploded, and I learned that they would to erase The Dunes so that way modern Las Vegas never relives what was the past – where Las Vegas was formerly the “sin city” and where mobsters made their living there in the 1970s and 1980s.
        So, fortunately, I was never a fan of the Dunes Hotel when it was blasted to bits, but I had a teeny inspiration with the outdoor sign that was at a bit of a distance from the main hotel. Now that is gone—as well as the hotel, so I am not really upset about this. It makes me want to think of other things…I can think “sand dunes”—what I heard in the 1980s when I attended Beacon School, but I did not knew  what “dunes” were---just sand.
      How Las Vegas really changed in 1995 and I realized that another Las Vegas hotel, the Sands,
was going to be imploded in still another movie, which I learned was Mars Attacks!—one of my
favorite movies up to the day related to science fiction.

A Unique Shorthand If You Need To Quickly Jot Down Information To Dispatchers In Case Of An Active Shooter Situation

When an active shooter is in your vicinity, we all know time is very essential. Writing down full words on any piece of paper to try to tell dispatchers your exact location when an active shooter incident is happening nearby before the police or other authorities arrive not only can be a waste of time - it can also be the difference between you living through this very scary situation - or you being shot and.or killed!

From Laurie Dann - to Eric Klebold - from Winnetka, IL to Littleton, CO - active shooting incidents make us wonder what we need to do so we can survive the next active shooting event.

With all of this in my mind, I am trying to make my own shorthand that you can use when jotting down information on the active shooter or shooters on paper to emergency dispatchers. This will be revised as much as possible so that anyone inside any building - not just schools - can use so they can save lives of themselves and others.

The shorthand I am trying make up focuses on four main parameters........

Descriptions of the Weapon (s) The Shooter (s) Used
Number of Shooter (s)
Number of Shooters
Description Related To The Shooter (s)

DESCRIPTIONS OF THE WEAPON (S) THE SHOOTER USED
AK47 - AK47 Assault Rifle
AR15-AR-15 Rifle
auto - Automatic
Bush - similar to AR 15 (short for "Bushmaster")
bd amr - Body Armor
bpk - Backpack
clp - Clip
cvr - Cover (an army cap usually used by soldiers)
ex mgz - Extra Magazine
flk jkt - Flak Jacket
hgn - handgun
mgm  -  Magnum
mchn g - machine gun
mgz - Magazine
pas - Pump-Action shotgun
pstl - pistol
sem auto - Semi-Automatic
sgl st - single-shot
sgn - Shotgun
slnr - Silencer
uz - UZI semiautomatic gun

NUMBER OF SHOOTERS
1S - one shooter
2S - two shooters
3S - three shooters
4S - four shooters
Svl S -several shooters

DESCRIPTION RELATED TO THE SHOOTER (S)
bdna - bandanna
Bl -Black (skin description)
bs v - bass voice
bge - beige
bld - blond
blk  - black
bprf - bulletproof
bprf v - bulletproof vest
brd - beard
brn - brown
Ccsn- Caucasian
cflg - camouflage
fc - face
ft - fat
grn - green
hd  - head
hr - hair
Hspan - hispanic
m - man, male
ME - Middle-Eastern (in appearance)
mstch - mustache
obs - obese
org - orange
pur - purple
pnk - pink
r       - red
sld - slender
st -   short
tl - tall
tt - one tattoo
tts - multiple tattoos
v st - very short
v tl - very tall
vlt - violet
vst - vest
wte  - white

LOCATION OF THE SHOOTER (S)
atc - attic
btrm - bathroom
bsmt - basement
clst - closet
cm ara - common area
cnf a - conference area
cnf rm - conference room
cls rm - classroom
ctr - center
crdr - corridor
dn a -dining area
dn rm -dining room
gf - ground floor
hw, hwy - hallway
ev sht - elevator shaft
ext - exit
extr - exterior; outside
fac lge - faculty's lounge
in - inside
intr - interior
kchn - kitchen
l - left
lw fl - lower floor
m - middle, midway
mn flr - main floor
ofce - office
out - outside
r - right
rf - roof
rst r - restroom
s bsmt - sub-basement
strs - stairs
strwy - stairway
tch l - teacher's lounge
up fl -upper floor
wg - wing
vcn, vcny - vicinity
1f - first floor
2f - second floor
3f - third floor
4f - fourth floor
5t - fifth floor

Saturday, September 17, 1983—The Date That I Witnessed The White Sox Clinching Something Big

      I realized what was going to be big about the White Sox game against the Seattle Mariners as I was glued to my TV set.

     Jerry Hairston, no. 17 who had already had 15 pinch hits, comes up to bat for the Sox. He had a batting average of .297, with 5 homers and 22 runs batted in. He reminded me of Reggie Jackson, for he seemed to have worn some sunglasses, but I think it was a mirage. Then, I see Julio Cruz is on deck. I saw that Jerry Hairston’s first two swings are strikes, and then, there was a ball. And then he drives a line shotto Seattle’s Reinecke (no. 21) to first base for a quick putout.

     Then, I observed Julio Cruz, no. 16 ,coming to bat. He walked and scored, and bounced to second base as I saw Rudy Law is on beck.

    The commentators told me that 45,646 was the paid attendance, and they reached the 2,000,000 mark in paid attendance in 1987.

       I then saw 3 straight balls at Julio Cruz. Then I saw ball four and Julio Cruz walks to first. Del Crandell was the Mariners’ manager who comes up at the starting pitcher for a time out, and then he goes back to the dugout.  Next, I saw Rudy Law had a batting average of .288, with 3 homers and 30 runs batted in. He was 1 for 4 with a single. And I found out that Sox’s Julio Cruz had 52 stolen bases with 63 attempts at that time. Then Julio Cruz successfully steals base no. 53 and I see him do a belly-flop slight almost like Pete Rose would do.

       Afterwards, I saw that Law ends up with a good count with 3 balls, and Caudill, no. 37, is the pitcher. Then Seattle’s Caudill walks Cruz. Bill Caudill is his full name. At the time he walked Cruz, I learned that he had two walks and no strikeouts.

      Then I saw an important Sox player come to bat--here comes Carlton Fisk, no. 72. His batting average is .291, with 25 homers and 81 runs batted in. His first pitch at-bat is a ball. Then Carlton Fisk check-swings at strike three and the Seattle catcher throws at third base as Julio Cruz tries to steal third and the home plate umpire calls strike three, but the home plate umpire wants an appeal to the third base umpire----and the third base umpire says NO SWING! The White Sox get second life and that was a very close call I felt.

      Then, I lamented slightly as Carlton Fisk is waved off and Harold Baines will be the pinch hitter. Then Bill Caudill is eventually ordered to leave the game by the manager. As the pitching change happens, I hear the crowd in the stands chanting “Runaround Sue” with the help of Nancy Faust.  I then saw relief picture Ed Vandeberg has 2 wins, 4 losses, and an ERA of 3.54, warming up on the mound.   

      I then looked at the TV cameras at Ken Harrelson is in the White Sox clubhouse awaiting a possible clincher celebration if the White Sox win this game. Later on, as Harold Baines takes the first few pitches, I hear Nancy Faust play one of my most-beloved old-time songs, “Hava Nagliah” to rally the thing, Harold then hits a sacrifice pop-up to the Seattle center fielder, and the fielder catches it, and I see Julio Cruz tag and run for his life towards home plate. The throw is delivered towards home plate but it is too late and I went to the bed and fell down on the mattress, realizing that the Sox got what they wanted—an American League Western Championship clinching!!!

      The celebration immediately after the final out was a bit like the 1973 celebration of the world series championship clincher by the Oakland A’s as they finished off the Mets. Just like what happened at the Oakland Coliseum on that moment, some of the fans stormed onto the field at Comiskey Park, the Sox gang-banged themselves around the infield as the exploding scoreboard set off its short, big flurry of pyrotechnics, and organist Nancy Faust wailed “Na Na Hey Hey Good-bye” in grand fashion. Then the Sox stormed into the dugout and into the clubhouse for the big celebration that involved a lot of champagne drinking—and of course, spraying. At one point, the catch phrase used by the Sox—“Winning Ugly”—I did not mind it or who coined that term. But still, I was a bit glad that the Sox would really be in the post season. The Chicago Cubs – they would get their turn next year, but for the time being, it was, for me, a time for the White Sox—and its fans—to celebrate a clincher like this.  

 

ASIDE: A Look Into One of my Freeform Electroacoustic Pieces: "Drums Only"

Inspired by the avant-garde composer that I never met, Salvatore Giovanni Martirano, I had decided on a free-form work that used my Kurzweil PC-88 synthesizer and used the "Kurz Clean Kit" as my drum palette for all of its 88-keys. I called this piece "Drums Only", and I had intended to dedicate the piece to Salvatore, but

regrettably, I was unable to do that--he died of ALS in 1996, so I was thinking of dedicating it to the

surviving members of the Martiranos, particularly Dorothy Martirano.

Here is the breakdown of the sections of this and thanks to my autism that caused me to fall in love with

the drums again, I think I felt a lot better as I tried to become the best composer ever in the

avant-garde music world....

2:07        acceleration

2:20        train effect (very fast)

2:42        cymbal crash

2:45        cymbal crash

2:48        cymbal crash

2:50        cymbal crash

2:51        cymbal crash

2:57        full series of cymbal crashes

3:08        slow-down

3:29        change to swing rhythm with cymbals

3:55        swing rhythm (more cymbals)

4:06        drum fill

4:08        cymbals

4:15        cymbals (ride/swing rhythm)

4:30        snare drums added to swing rhythms

5:01        hockets in snare drum

5:08        bass drum attacks

5:14        transfer to Latin (whites, congas, timbles)

5:44        claves and cymbals added to Latin rhythm

6:14        syncopated timbale rhythm (3:2 son clave)

6:43        full merengue rhythm and salsa rhythm (combined)

7:07        drum fill

7:08        full merengue rhythm and salsa rhythm (combined)

7:18        cymbal crashes (continuous) in merengue rhythm

7:55        tremolo and the slow down using all the instruments in Latin

8:15        change to rumba rhythm (contemporary)

9:10        cymbal crashes again (Latin triplet-style swing/blues

9:49        Ride and crash cymbal crashes with regular rhythm

10:11      crashes of cymbals in syncopation

10:26      change of rhythm--cymbals

10:35      disco/Latin fusion/Goin' guidance happy feeling

11:22      disco/Latin fusion/Goin' guidance (continues)

11:36      disco ends

11:40      new rhythm

12:00      big cymbal crashes

12:02      change of rhythm with bass

12:18      salsa

12:40      timbales added

13:00      drum fill

13:07      cha-cha rhythm (guaracha)

13:32      claves added to cha-cha rhythm

14:05      full cymbal crashes

14:28      rock rhythm

14:42      16th notes continuous bass or snare

15:00      accleeration (bass/snare/tom-tom)

15:14      fast snares (short rolls)

15:38      cymbal crashes and bass hits

16:00      tom-tom hits and slow down of bass drum

16:15      swing rhythm with tom-toms and snares only

16:38      big cymbal crashes

17:10      DISCO AGAIN!!!!

17:30      5 cymbal crashes in basic disco rhythm

17:54      claves and bells

18:02      house sounds and horn sounds

18:38      running 16th notes Latin style

19:28      running faster and faster

19:42      slower, and accelerating, still in that Latin rhythm

20:00      alternating rhythm of Fast Latin

20:10      no bass line

20:46      merengue again (with claves, no. 1 and no. 2)

21:24      claves

21:33      a la Tito Puente (Timbales!)

22:22      cymbal crashes

22:32      crash and hi-hats

22:42      slowing down again with claves (and grinder)

23:02      slow down again

23:21      acceleration

23:38      full acceleration (with bass, a la Buddy Rich)

23:59      cymbal crashes

24:04:00                cymbal crashes

24:40:00                raking tom tom

25:01:00                snare trum flams/flam taps

25:24:00                swing rhythm comes back again

25:39:00                swing rhythm with cymbals and snare

25:57:00                crashes

26:00:00                back to rhythm

26:10:00                Djembe rhythm

27:28:00                Whistle in the djembe

27:42:00                house drum hits in djembe

28:06:00                Chinese style with house and grinder

28:40:00                cymbal hi-hats and cymbals (still in djembe)

28:55:00                CHANGE OF RHYTHM

29:00:00                Ride cymbals

29:36:00                big cymbal crashes in djembe again

30:00:00                whipper snappers'

30:20:00                snare hits (rim shots)

30:47:00                Chinese sound goes back again in fast swing

31:11:00                change of rhythm

31:22:00                SAMBA!!!

32:20:00                whistles and Chinese hits in samba

32:48:00                slight changes in samba rhythm

33:12:00                change of percussion but still samba

35:10:00                house sounds in samba rhythm

35:36:00                end of samba

35:38:00                RUMBA

36:02:00                slight slap

36:11:00                PASO DOBLE

36:52:00                highlight cymbal crash (paso doble)

37:10:00                claves added to paso doble rhythm

37:44:00                finale of paso

37:51:00                back to the swing thing

38:21:00                big cymbal crash

38:30:00                5 cymbal crashes

38:48:00                house music

39:06:00                Chinese sound goes back in house music

40:00:00                little change in house rhythm

40:40:00                bass, bass and more bass (3-son clave)

41:00:00                running drum fills

41:22:00                hi-hat mainly solo

41:42:00                full fills

41:53:00                real cymbal crashes (continues)

42:10:00                running, acclerating tom toms

42:48:00                final flourish

43:12:00                end

List of Details on My Ragusa-Ibla Trip on July 2001

Facts on Ragusa-Ibla From My Experiences

1.       Like  Paris, you face aggressive bus drivers and motor scooter and moped operators going

down the narrow streets. Sometimes some of those vehicles are pretty loud even though their engines may be small, so I had to prepare to hear backfires from some of the engines.

2.       Also like Paris, Ragusa-Ibla have international signs, especially for driving.

3.       Their local bus is almost always orange.

4.       Unlike Paris, Ragusa-Ibla’s sidewalks do not incline at the street level at all for people with

disabilities.

5.       Also unlike Paris, Ragusa-Ibla’s square have overhanging floodlights that go on at night.

Facts on Our Room In The Hotel (the L’Albergo Raphael)

1.       A very long, brown, sun-blocking curtain is at the window.

2.       The floor is tiled in a scale pattern with a lavender color

3.       There is a brown refrigerator, with the brand name called Elektrosuisse.

4.       There were two nightstands, white with pink trim, on the sides of the double bed.

5.  Since no laundry facilities for the public exist in the hotel, you do laundry in the bathroom on

your own, and at your own risk.

More Facts on Ragusa-Ibla

1.       The Scotch masking tape does even have a brand name labeled on that in that Italian region. The top roller sometimes gets stuck and sometimes the cutter does not cut the tape clearly.     

      

   

   2. The brand name of chewing gum there is Brooklyn, and I found that the spearmint flavor variety was the best kind.

3.       One bank has a closed-circuit magnetometer on its entrance doors to thwart bank robberies.

4.       When you get on the local bus, you put the white-green bus ticket into the fare stamper on

the “Lato Obbligatrice” side.

5.       At the Hotel Montreal, the breakfast area near the Via San Giuseppe closes at 10 a.m. to prepare for lunch.

More about the Pianos at the Hotels

A.      THE PIANO AT HOTEL MONTREAL

The notes on that piano only went up to an A8, and not to the highest notes, B or C. The piano

itself was about 10 feet by 11 feet range and had a tilted floor.

B.       THE PIANO AT HOTEL RAFAEL

        The piano was a black-colored studio upright, called Burger and Jacoby, of Biel. The keys

        on the piano were slightly rusted-through.

Broadwood Pianos on display at the Falcone – What I Saw

1.       The Broadwood spinet, one of the pianos that I saw at the concert hall, had two pedals. Its keys were rusted, and the black keys were slightly smaller. Upper part had a red curtain cover over the hammers, and its skin was dark brown, and the piano had a music stand. The pitch range of that piano was from an F1 to F8, something like in the period when Ludwig van Beethoven lived (1770-1827).

2.       Another Broadwood which I saw, which had a clavichord-like keyboard design, had the same range as the other Broadwood, with no pedals, and also had the music stand.

Its keys were rusted also, and the piano was on four legs.

The 1989 San Francisco Quake—Is It A Warning For What Chicago Could Experience With The Predicted New Madrid Fault Quake Coming In The Near Future?

                “…..as the Oakland A’s take….take……I THINK WE’RE HAVING AN EARTHQUAKE!!”

                                                     --Al Michaels and Tim McCarver

        These are the most famous words I heard from these sportscasters who were part of the ABC televised broadcast of Game 3 of the 1989 World Series on October 17, said at the time that an surprise temblor unexpected knocked off their TV signal and temporarily halted the game’s activities for a while in Candlestick Park in San Francisco. I would experience the first time ever that a televised baseball game was knocked off the air due to an earthquake, but I was lucky not to be in San Francisco—I was in Chicago when that went down.

         Before the big shaker under the earth happened, I saw ABC was into pre-game coverage of what they called the “Battle of the Bay” as the Oakland A’s battled not against the Cincinnati Reds, or the New York Mets, or even the Los Angeles Dodgers (in the famous dynasty years of 1972, 1973, and 1974, where the A’s beat these three teams in the years’ World Series, winning back-to-back-to-back World Series championships), but against another Major League team that is also from California, but it was not the Dodgers—it was a team called the San Francisco Giants.

        I saw that Tim McCarver, the color commentator alongside Al Michaels, was mentioning to World Series viewers in the opening minutes of the pre-game of the fall classic about a few highlights of Game 2 at the Oakland Coliseum. One of the highlights McCarver recalled was the Oakland A’s Dave Parker attempting to hit a home run in the bottom of the 4^th inning but  misses it by a few feet as the ball hits the outfield wall, with Giants’  Candy Maldonado, the outfielder, taking up the ball, and single-pumping the ball before throwing it in full commitment into the infield as A’s’ Jose Canseco runs and successfully scores a run as the ball throw was cut off at second base unsuccessfully as Dave Parker reaches second base with a double and an RBI to boot,  and at that point, I heard the background noise of the stadium crowd roaring—I thought at first it was a signal that the Giants have went onto the field, and then, suddenly, I saw the TV screen flash into snowball and white-and-black lines for 3-4 seconds with distortion sounds, then the broadcasters announced to the crowd the word “earthquake”  just before I saw the TV display disappear into a super with green background that said “World Series”, in a still picture, and the audio was temporarily silenced for a couple minutes. As this sudden thing---probably the most famous interruption ever done by an earthquake in my whole history of watching sporting events on TV---happened, I wondered as the program went off the air for about two minutes, how big the earthquake was and I did not know at that point if the quake was really the big one in California. I did not know about any deaths, injuries, or damage at that point but I realized by the knocking out of the TV signal that the quake was probably huge, and I realized after ABC went back on the air, and I saw the first news footage of the quake, where a double-decker expressway bridge in the city  buckled and caused a vehicle to cave in, and another area in San Francisco where there was a large gas-related fire due to a broken gas main in some residential area of the city, gave me quick conclusions that the fault that caused the quake—the San Andreas Fault---was responsible for the main shock, and from seeing the footage of the quake damage, I was thinking that the quake may have reached nearly 7.0 on the Richter Scale and about 9 to 10 in the Mercalli scale. I was about 60-70 percent right in my predictions. Also, when the picture came back, I realized that most of the fans in the stadium remained even though I did not know if stadium officials wanted the fans to evacuate the stadium just in case of possible aftershocks, and I saw that the roof and the decks of the stadium were mainly unscathed.

        The way I had got lucky that Chicago avoided that October 20, 1989 earthquake that happened in San Francisco—the quake that rocked—as well as interrupted—the 1989 World Series---was interesting. The main shock that rocked the City By The Bay happened just 2 days from my 19^th birthday…and was something that at first made me laugh to myself about it. Five years after 1989, however, I got word that the New Madrid Fault that cuts through the Tennessee Valley and touches the tip of extreme southern Illinois could be in for a catastrophic earthquake in the near future, which could cause severe damage to the Champaign-Urbana area (my campus town alma-mater, about 150 miles away from the fault zone),and Chicago (located about 300 miles north away from the fault line)  could get hit with a 3.0 to 4.0 magnitude (maybe a 4.0 most likely). I realized that the main authority on earthquake prediction happens to be the USGS—the United States Geological Survey,  which announced this earthquake prediction ever since a past major earthquake (which happened on  December 16, 1811, with a magnitude reaching about 7.5 on the Richter, so that means on the Mercalli scale, maybe close to a 10 or 11 rating—nearly catastrophic) along the new Madrid fault changed the course of the Mississippi River in the area at the fault line.

1997--Bugs--And Then The Brain Bug--Makes Me Fall In Love With The Science Fiction Flick Called "Starship Troopers"

Bugs – and then the Brain Bug – Makes Me Fall In Love With The Science-Fiction Flick Called “Starship Troopers”

       This movie may not be exactly “War of the Worlds”, but it is a twist on it from my standpoint. So I learned that the main character in “Starship Troopers”---Johnny Rico, after graduating from a high school from Buenos Aires (his hometown), joining up with the Federal Service to fight against bugs from the planets making up a fictional system called Klendathu, was not going to be a cakewalk for him. 

      First, I saw him go through boot-camp facing Drill Sergeant Zim, and even through the tough training, he gets quickly enamoured by recruit trainee, Dizzy Flores, a tough, rugged military lady who can fight like a man. Then I see Johnny then make it up through the ranks as squad leader, and had dreams that his second love interest, pilot trainee Carmen Ibanez (not knowing yet about  Rico's love for Dizzy) informs Johnny that she is going to have a full-time career in the Federal Service fleet, wanting to be a fleet ship commander, hurting Rico’s chance for any intimate relationship with her. Then, everything is stripped bare from Rico when during a live-fire exercise, he accidentally kills teammate Breckenridge, gets flogged 10 stripes with his demotion to private, and decides to leave the boot camp area. But then, I observed in the area that word spreads out that a bug meteor from Klendathu impacted Buenos Aires into a fiery holocaust with millions of people dead. Then I see Johnny decided to re-instate himself as a private to fight in the war, even with strong resistance from Sergeant Zim. 

       I then observed that Fleet battle station Ticonderoga is the main action point for the first offensive against the Klendathu planet, or Big K. The fleet flotilla does make a massive assault despite bug batteries firing plasma. But then, the arachnid soldiers on the planet were ready for the Fleet soldiers, with over 100,000 casualties for the Fleet after the 1st attack.

       Sky Marshal Dienes resigns after the failure of that 1st offensive and a replacement sky marshal sets up the 2nd attack. The Zegema Beach attack is a much better success as the Fleet fighter planes bomb the arachnids dead on the ground, and then the MI (mobile infantry) comes in to kill off the remaining arachnids, including a tanker bug.

       A major then informs Johnny that a distress call on Planet P is serious, breaking their rest break during his love scene with Dizzy which I liked in the film. (This part reminded me of my past loves). On P itself, Johnny's rank is raised to sergeant as the Mobile platoon finds Port Joe Smith, abandoned with bloody baths of dead soldiers. They find General Owen locked up in the port's command post, take him out of the post, and realizing that an arachnid ambush is coming, the platoon makes a counterattack that would soon fail, but a rescue ship saves their day. Regrettably, Dizzy is badly wounded by a rogue arachnid as the platoon retreats on the rescue ship, and later dies, making Johnny swallow his pride.

      Now, the last offensive in the flick focuses on getting back to Planet P to capture a brain bug that may be responsible for the failed Klendathu offensive.

      Well, fortunately, even though the Fleet offensive sustains heavy losses and Carmen and his pilot instructor escape from an escape pod from the Jolly Roger command ship that gets destroyed by bug plasma, right into Bug City, they could not escape one arachnid, but Johnny finally rescues the two out

of the way. 

      Finally, I saw that the brain bug is finally caught, but it was a close call for Carmen and Johnny.

       I give the movie 3 ½ stars.

June 17, 1983--My Reactions to "Superman III"

Note: This post does have some spoliers.

     When I first saw this flick, Ross Webster now becomes sort of a offshoot of the evil Lex Luthor in the Superman and Superman II.
    With that, Ross in Superman III focuses on Gus Gorman (a computer expert played by Richard Pryor) to defeat the powers of Superman by modifying all of his regular behaviors of what Superman stands for--good, kindness, and sincerity.
    I then realized that the attack on Superman was three-prong. First, Ross forces Gus Gorman to alter the  weather satellites on a computer mainframe system, so that the altering will cause a major tropical storm in Colombia that would destroy the country's coffee crop and terribly destroy the world markets that depend on that valuable crop.
    I also see that Gus does his evil deed but was informed that Superman countered this super-storm over Columbia by his common super-strengths (like turning a twister upside down or blowing strong winds with his mouth to dry up the flooded crops), which made Ross mad.

     Then, the second prong is to find Superman's chemical qualities, which included of course, Kryptonite, made of course from the planet Krypton, which detonated completely by the super-heating sun in the first Superman movie. Gus gets back to a mainframe computer station and does find the exact chemical qualities in the Krypton, and then, that Krypton rock is sent to Superman, and then, Superman becomes two parts--one angry and drunk--called "bad Superman", and the other part, called "good Superman." 

     This leads to the final battle in a garbage dump between the two different Supermans...finally, a choke hold by the good Superman ends the bad Superman for good. When I saw that happened—it was a sigh of relief!
     The third prong attack on the good Superman (with the "bad Superman" now gone) focuses on Gus's design of a supercomputer somewhere in the desert Southwest. I then saw that Ross then beckons Superman in the final conflict, and Superman knows that he has to be stopped before the supercomputer rules Ross's goal of world conquest that could lead to worldwide chaos and destruction.
    I found that this third prong attack was in 2 stages. In stage 1, as Superman comes towards the location of the cave from the outside, he is greeted by plenty of surface-to-air rockets (part of the computer's exterior defense system) that aims toward him, but Superman does evade the destructive missiles as Ross, along with two lady assistants, uses the supercomputer as some time of video game as they were destined to kill Superman. When those regular missiles were ineffective, there was a call to fire the MX--a much bigger surface-to-air missile, which does hit Superman and he falls to the ground near the cave. At the same time, Gus Gorman goes into the cave and sees his computer creation come to life. Gus then is greeted graciously by Ross, to join in the computer's bells and whistles to try to finish off Superman.
     Superman does get up after the MX missile hit and is back to the fight quickly, and I see him go right into the supercomputer cave, and tells Ross that this game is over. This leads to Stage 2 of Ross's attack, when Ross then stops Superman with the computer's Krypton laser pulse--the chemical Gus made. As Superman is stunned in terrible pain and collapses, Gus then runs into the main power switch and pulls the plug, turning the whole computer off.
     This buys time for Superman, but suddenly, the computer goes on again, and Gus realizes that the computer wants to be something like a monster. It had gone completely mad, and one lady assistant is entrapped by the device and becomes an evil cyborg. Superman leaves the cave and comes back with a closed special acid canister that is inert. He then stops the cyborg, but then the mad computer was about the eat at Superman with shock hits and is about to fatally entrap him; at this point, I saw him open up the acid canister, and I saw the acid do its work. It eats away and then destroys the whole supercomputer from the inside out--starting with small--and then big--explosions.
      After all of the explosions were over, I now find that the supercomputer is now rubble with twisted and bent steel, and I then see that Superman comes out from the destruction, was able to find Gus alive (he hid somewhere to evade the carnage), and takes Gus back alive, out of the cave, to his original workplace. Superman says that the other people will be brought to justice, including Ross.

     From all of the seriousness of this flick, there is a lighter part of this movie where Lois Lane is introduced to a brand new writer for the Daily Planet, Lana Lane. She appears brighter in appearance than the original Lois. The ending of the movie was, I thought, something that Superman had which wasa new trait—the ability to bring a historic structure back to its normal place, and that is what Superman did to bring the Tower of Pisa, which went straight up when Superman turned bad, back to its original leaning position. The Italian clay makers who saw Superman, as I see it, realize what happened and I see the makers use sledgehammers to destroy those uprighted statue replicas of Pisa….well, that made me laugh too.