Friday, 10/9

 You know what? I don’t have a favorite number.

I don’t know if it’s a big deal that I don’t have a favorite number, just as I have no idea how many people actually DO have a favorite number. All I know is that I don’t have one, and this came to light after reading an article or an essay or something that talked about people’s favorite numbers and how a large majority of them are even numbers.

Maybe, just to level the playing field, I should get myself a favorite number, and make sure it’s odd. Besides, how apt would it be that my favorite number is odd? Certainly would fit, wouldn’t it?

The article (and I wish I remember where I read it, so I could give the author credit) posited that most people’s favorite numbers are even numbers because, for whatever reason, people perceive even numbers as “nice” and odd numbers as “bad”. I’m not quite sure why; I think the article pointed out that, with one exception, all prime numbers are odd and, for some reason, people don’t like prime numbers. That could be a reason. But there’s also something I’ve kind of noticed over the years--even numbers look friendlier.

No, I’m not strange. Well, yes, I suppose I AM strange, but think about it--when you look at an even number like “8”, it just looks friendlier than, say a “15”, which just looks more severe. Or at least it does to me; after all, this theory has absolutely no basis in scientific fact. It’s just how I perceive the way the numbers look. But, according to the article I read, maybe there IS some basis in it. Maybe I’m not the only person who feels that even numbers look “friendlier” than odd numbers.

That might explain why most people have a favorite number that’s even, right?

So like I said, if I ever do picture out a favorite number, I’ll have to make sure that it’s an odd number, perhaps even a prime odd number, just so I can be a contrarian. Right now, I’m thinking 29, although that could change depending upon my whims.

I’ll let you know. And on that note, have yourself an “even” weekend. Or an “odd” one. Just as long as it's a GOOD one.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Thursday, 10/8

It's not easy being part Vulcan.

I say that in jest, of course. My DNA says I'm 100% human, so I'm taking Ancestry's word on that. However, having grown up watching a show that features a Vulcan, I'm often wondering about the illogic of certain situations.

Here's one of them.

I had to take Loraine's car out yesterday for a few errands. Because I don't drive much, I'm often very alert when I'm behind the wheel. I keep my eyes where they're supposed to be—on the road—and I don't pay attention to too much else.

However, while on the bypass on the way home, I noticed something pop up on her dashboard display. I was doing what I was supposed to, keeping my eyes on the road, but I noticed it out of the corner of my eye.

What popped up on her dashboard display? This--

Yup. While I was driving Loraine's car popped up a message that I should be keeping my eyes on the road. Of course, to read the message about keeping my eyes on the road, I had to take my eyes off the road. How—on Earth, Vulcan, or any other planet—does that make sense?

There's no logic to it!

I don't know who thought it would be a good idea to have you read a message about keeping your eyes on the road while you're trying to do just that. It totally defeats the purpose of keeping your eyes on the road if you have to take your eyes off the road to read the message. Yet, either Chevrolet or OnStar or some combination thereof thought that it would be a good idea to do just that. Were they not thinking? Have they never driven before? Or were they thinking, somewhat deviously, that “if we get people to read the message and take their eyes off the road they'll wreck their car, and we'll make money selling their insurance company a new one?”

These days, nothing would surprise me.

So there you go. The latest example of non-logic that totally perplexed a logical person. And just so you know, I took the picture after I pulled into the driveway, and no longer needed to keep my eyes on the road. Maybe that's when OnStar and/or Chevrolet should think about putting the message on the dashboard display, and NOT when the driver is (theoretically, and logically) trying to keep their eyes on the road!

(jim@wmqt.com) 

Wednesday, 10/7

 You want proof recycling pays? I found $10 in our recycling bin last night.

No; seriously, I found a $10 bill in our paper bin last night. And it's a good thing I found it, too. This is the first week of single-stream recycling in Marquette, the first week where you don't have to put out just papers or just plastics & metals. You can throw everything together. So instead of carefully going through the recycling I was just tossing everything into a bin, not really paying attention to what I was doing. When I brought it out to the curb, I noticed a strange looking orange-y piece of paper sticking out of the paper bin. I took a look, and lo and behold, there was a ten dollar bill, ready for me to grab.

See? It does pay to recycle.

Unlike many of these weird instances in my life, where a $10 bill might mysteriously appear in my life, I have a pretty good idea where this one came from. It was stuck to the grocery store receipt I tossed in the bin Saturday after getting back from the store. I believe what happened was the $10 was attached somehow to the receipt, and when I tossed the receipt into the bin I didn't notice the $10 bill stuck to it. It then became loose when I moved the bin around, and that's when I noticed it.

First, a buffalo nickel; now, a $10 bill. I suppose I should really start paying attention to the change I get, huh?

I'm serious. You'd think a normal, reasonably sane person would notice that they're missing a $10 bill, right? I mean, I always assumed that I would notice if I was missing a $10 bill. But nope. I can now say, with absolutely no pride at all, that I can throw a ten spot into the recycling bin and not even realize it.

I know. It's a gift.

The second thing is this—if I didn't recycle everything I could, I'd be out the ten bucks. If I didn't recycle I would've tossed the receipt and the money attached to it into the trash, and I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't have been randomly moving or digging through the trash enough to cause the money to get loose from the receipt, which is how I noticed it in the first place. The $10 bill would've just gone out to the Marquette County Landfill, where it would've ended up getting mulched into a pulp so the paper could be re-used to put together, I dunno, more grocery store receipts.

Like I said, it was a stupid mistake that I made tossing it in the first place. But thanks to the fact that I recycle 90% of the stuff I use, I was able to find the $10 bill I mistakenly tossed in the first place. So if you are ever told that recycling doesn't pay...

That person is lying. Trust me on that!

(jim@wmqt.com)

Tuesday, 10/6

 I'd be a catch if I were single.

First of all, let me state this—I am not single. I have not been single for many years. I don't wish to be single again. I am not implying anything with this blog other than the facts about to be stated. So don't read anything into it other than the fact that if I were somehow to be single, I have two things going for me.

'Nuff said.

Now, my “weird fact” yesterday had to do with the two things people are looking for when on a dating website. We've all heard stories about how said sites are not always filled with, well, the best of catches. My single friends have often verified that fact. But there seem to be two things that are deal-breakers, at least for 88 percent of women and 75 % of men.

The biggest deal-breaker is personal hygiene. Apparently, if you post a picture of yourself in bad clothing, or looking like you haven't washed your hair in three weeks, that turns most people off.

Who knew, he says sarcastically.

The other? Bad grammar. Poor spelling and not knowing which there, their, or they're to use is a turn-off for both men and women, although more women than men. So if you find yourself on a dating website any time in the near future, you know what to avoid.

That's okay. You can thank me later.

Like I said at the beginning of this, I'm not single, nor do I have the desire to be single. But I'd like to think that I'm pretty good with my own personal hygiene. And I know how to construct a sentence like, say, “They're on their way there”. So if the world were to flip on its axis—or flip on its axis more than it already has in 2020—and I found myself needing the services of a dating website, I would hope that I would pass muster.

After all, it seems like it's hard being single these days. Who knew there was so much pressure to get everything absolutely right?? Any kind of head start a person can get, I guess, is a start well worth exploiting.

8-)

(jim@wmqt.com)

Monday, 10/5

 I got a Buffalo nickel for change over the weekend.

I don’t even remember where I was or what I bought, but when I got home Saturday I noticed I’d been given a Buffalo nickel. I saw it when I was going through my change; I usually keep the quarters, and put any pennies, nickels, & dimes into the big change thingee we have on the front desk at work, and when it gets filled I bring it across the street to Range Bank to do my little part to help out with the national coin shortage.

Only...does a Buffalo nickel still count? It IS a nickel, right?

Now, the only reason I know what a Buffalo nickel is is that, when I was a kid, I was into coin collecting for a little while (yes, my geekiness goes that far back, believe it or not). I used to have those blue books where you’d collect each kind of coin from each year, press them in the book, and then gaze at them, wondering why you couldn’t find a 1943 steel penny or an old Mercury dime.

Just think what I would’ve been like if I was a kid when state & national park quarters were issued!

Anyway, that’s how I know what a Buffalo nickel is. It’s the nickel they issued before Jefferson nickels (the current ones) came out in 1938. So I know my Buffalo nickel is at least 82 years old; unfortunately, because it’s so worn, I have no idea just HOW old it is.

In case you didn’t know, they grade coins on a scale that starts at uncirculated and goes down from there, depending upon how worn said coin is. Well, seeing as how I can’t even see the date the coin was minted, I’m guessing mine might be in the “Melt It Down For A Doorstop” grade, assuming, of course, they have a “Melt It Down For A Doorstop” grade.

Which I’m guessing they don’t.

Buffalo nickels were produced in the U.S. from 1913 to 1938, which means mine can’t be any older than (ironically) 107 years. The back of it’s in okay shape; I can see the buffalo and the “E Pluribus Unum”, among other things. But on the front of the coin the head of the Native American chief is almost gone, especially around his neck where, it appears, the minting date was stamped. I don’t feel bad, though; according to Wikipedia, most Buffalo nickels have the date worn off, so I guess I’m in good company!

And according to something else I found online, Buffalo nickels without a date have their value greatly decreased. I mean, there are some specimens of the coin that are worth $1,800; even average examples of the nickel are worth at least 35 cents. But with the date worn off?

Well, they’re worth about a nickel.

So I’m left to wonder just how this particular Buffalo nickel was given to me for change. Did someone accidentally pay for something with part of their coin collection? Did they know, but because the coin’s worth a nickel, decide to use it as a nickel? Or has it been a coin that’s been circulating among the general crowd for 8 or 9 decades now, and I’m the first person geeky enough to notice it, thereby taking it out of circulation and ending its mysterious 8 or 9 decade-long voyage?

I tell ya...some days, it’s dangerous to look in your pockets. It really is.

(jim@wmqt.com)

Friday, 10/2

 I think I've figured out why.

What have I figured out? Well, as you may know, every August & September I'm always on the prowl for sunflowers, so I can photograph them to use on our station's Facebook page. Over the years, I've discovered that if I include a picture in a post it gets more viewers, and that's why “Mr. Sunflower” is now a valued member of our staff.

Even if he's always hanging around outside and never in the office.

Anyway, I've been looking for sunflowers to photograph, and outside of a couple blocks of Pine Street I've noticed a marked decline of them around Marquette. Being curious, I did a little Google search, and found out that most sunflowers aren't perennials. You have to plant them. Specifically, you have to plant them in the spring—in April & May. And what were we all doing in April & May of this year?

Yup. 2020 is, apparently, to blame for the lack of sunflowers around town this year. Is there anything this year CAN'T ruin?

8-)

*****

Before I go, I have to wish my favorite sister in the whole wide world a happy birthday! Well, technically her birthday's not until tomorrow, but that's neither here nor there.

Happy birthday, Mel!!!!

(jim@wmqt.com)

Thursday. 10/1

 The set's still ready to go. It's the other part of it that's not.

If you read this yesterday you know that our first scheduled taping of “High School Bowl” for the season won't be happening this Friday. As it turns out, the second taping of the season, scheduled for the Friday after that, won't be happening, either. As of right now, we're still set to go on October 16^th with the shoot for the third show of the season, but we'll have to see how that turns out.

As to whether or not we'll make our first air date, currently set for November 7^th? If I were a betting person—and I'm not—I'd be tempted to lay money on both “yes” & “no”, just because I have no idea at this moment.

The shoots for this & next Friday were postponed because of the mind-numbingly high Covid rates in some UP counties (64 new cases in Delta County alone yesterday), and the facts that students from those counties were set to join us on campus. That led the Powers-That-Be at NMU, who've done an amazing job of keeping rates at the school as low as humanly possible, to request the delay.

And I really don't fault them for that at all.

The same thing's going on with high school football here in the UP. Schedules were set, and then schools have had to back out, leaving their opponents to find an other teams, also set adrift by the pandemic, to play, or to just bag the week. Some teams will end up playing six games during the truncated season, while other might be able to eke out one or two. It's not fair, but it is what it is, and it's a little bit of what we're having to deal with to get our little quiz show going.

By the way, have I mentioned that if people would just wear masks that we wouldn't have to deal with stuff like this?

8-)

The gang at Public TV 13 will be using the two week delay to put even more finishing touches on the new set and all the electronics that go along with it, so in the end the final result may be even spiffier than it could've been. Let's just hope that “the end” to which I was referring is two weeks away, and not two months, or two years.

Because with the way 2020's been going, you never know.

(jim@wmqt.com)