Fair Fair fares at a fair Fair affair

I tutor GED for a community service organization and many of my "kids" are convicted felons.  I was under the impression that everyone was mandated to obtain their GED while in prison if they already did not have one nor their diploma but, I am obviously wrong. 

One of my charges was able to obtain a job with the state working at the State Fair in Syracuse.  I applaud the state for giving this guy a second chance and a job, especially since he has no apparent education.  Actually, this guy, with about 16 arrests for drugs and burglary, is a math wiz.  His skill with numbers is amazing.  The problem is, everything he knows is in the metric system because that is the system drug dealers use on the street.  The examples of Sally using inches and ounces make no sense to him and he has little use for the Imperial system in his line of work. 

So he asked me if I would like any comp passes to the fair and I said that I would.  He asked me how many I wanted and I said that I just needed two.  He pulled out a wad of tickets about half an inch thick.  I didn't ask but I surmised that he purloined this tidy treasure of tickets and while I still applaud the state, this just proves the old adage that sometimes no good deed goes unpunished. 

To make amends for my possibly ill-gotten admission passes, I decided that I would purchase something superfluous valued at twenty dollars from some random vendor at the fair.  I did and I will share that treasure with you later.

There were many pleasant surprises to the NYS Fair.  First, parking was free.  During the drive in, there were no peripheral businesses shutting down for the day in order to make a lucrative profit from their parking lots much like you would find at other fairs such as The Big E.  Parking was plentiful, the attendants were efficient and the lots appeared to be tiered on a hill.  We took the first lot we came to and it was on what appeared to be the third tier.  Much to my surprise, they had shuttle buses running every few minutes to ferry the visitors directly to the front entrance.  The people packing strollers had the option to take a pedestrian walkway high above the freeways of the city. 

On my bus, a couple with three kids decided to haul their stroller and a cooler onto the shuttle where they had difficulty navigating the turn.  While holding up our bus, the driver told them to take the stroller back outside and to the side door where it was a straight line into the bus.  Dad backed out with the stroller only to find that the back of the bus was packed.  The driver said that another shuttle was coming right up behind him.  That left mom alone with the three kids who were bursting with alacrity at the prospect of going to the fair.

At one point one of the children drifted down the aisle a bit and this made mom livid as she openly yelled and threatened the child that she would withhold ice cream, cotton candy and rides.  I felt bad for the kid since he suffered from the ailment of childhood exuberance and I thought that he would probably have been content taking the sky-walk and, it wasn't his fault that his lazy mom and dad decided to attempt taking a bulky stroller and cooler onto a crowded bus. 

That is another thing, you may bring your own food onto the fair grounds.  Good for the state.  This makes it so that people with limited lucre don't have to be at the mercy of the price gouging vendors within the park.  However, even that wasn't necessarily so at this state fair. 

You can often expect to pay three to four dollars for a bottle of water at most fairs.  Not at the NYS Fair.  One vendor was charging $1 and another was asking $1 for two bottles.  Soda:  $1.  Fried dough: $3.  You'd pay five or six dollars for that at other fairs.  A chicken or fish dinner was only $6.95 where at other fairs you would pay at least ten bucks.  Soda not included.

My date and I went to one of the cafeteria eateries where we each had a sausage and pepper sandwich, fries and re-fillable soda.  The total was $15.  That would have cost us about $30 at a fair such as the Big E and other smaller county fairs where gouging the customer is de rigueur. 

There was also a wine tasting tent which sported about fifteen tasting stations where you could try samples from little two ounce cups (I don't know what that is in metrics) to your heart's content.  There was another tent offering free and delicious wine slushies.  These sample stations were advertising NY wine makers and both tents were packed. 

Although they were checking ID's and there were many peripatetic security personnel , this did not deter many teens from drinking at the fair.  Several times I saw kids between tents or around the corners of buildings with a bottle in their hand.  On our shuttle ride back to the car, we suffered the unfortunate malady to be riding with a knot of drunken teenagers and two of the girls were so loud they overpowered the din of the rest of the bus.  Where were their parents?

What was really sad about our day, never have I seen such rude people before (other than in a church parking lot).  While getting on the shuttle to go back to our car, there was a stampede of people as the doors to the buses opened up.  Just in front of us several teens came up the side of the bus and one of them stepped in front of the crowd with his back to us and held up his arms in a cruciform stance.  This blocked the crowd and allowed his friends to slip in ahead of everyone else queued in line.  A woman in front of me ducked under his arm and with her elbow she clocked him in the ribs and then said something of a copulative nature.  The boy doubled over as the crowd quickly overtook him. 

The seats on the bus were contoured so each bench could seat two people.  An Asian woman was alone and she sat on the mini hump in the middle of the seat thus, taking up two spaces.  The bus had standing room only and several people were making snide remarks about this woman taking up two spaces.  She completely ignored them.  A woman behind me muttered from the ancient art of the invective, the "Ch" word, the concision of insult to an Asian.

As I was standing, I rotated my body around so that I could see her and I noticed that she was wearing a crucifix around her neck.  The crucifix, a symbol of passion, compassion, forgiveness, mercy, new life and sacrifice was obviously lost on her.  It was merely jewelry or bling.  As the old joke goes, had Jesus been guilty of a felony today, she would have been sporting either a gold plated hypodermic needle or an electric chair around her neck. 

When we got off the bus, as the horde of people dissipated, one of the drunken teens took it upon himself to whip it out and void right there in the open.  His female companion just stood there and waited.  This didn't bother me for as a hiker, this happens all the time on the trails and summits.  When you gotta go you gotta go.  Now, had a child witnessed this henious act this boy could have been arrested and ended up on the sex offender registry where he would be unemployable, probably driven out of his home by an angry mob and would not be able to hand out candy on Halloween.  Ironically, anyone who reads the paper knows that most sex crimes are not committed by strangers but by uncles, grand fathers, step dads, cousins and baby sitters.  Sandusky for instance was not a stranger to his victims but a trusted coach, friend and mentor who passed all his background checks and had parents willing to hand their children over to him for overnight stays.

Regarding the urinating in public, this guy could have been more discreet although my date got a good laugh out of it.  I can't help but wonder, what is the difference between this act and using a mens room?  The fair bathroom was simply a row of exposed urinals.  There was a line of men in there and at one of the porcelain receptacles was an eightish year old boy who leaned forward then cocked his head left and right to inspect the troupes.  Do the police know about this place?

Another moment of rudeness was when we were descending a flight of stairs.  There was an elderly man moving slowly in front of me holding onto the banister with his right hand.  A young woman coming up the stairs was ascending on the wrong side and upon encountering the old man, hugged the wall forcing the elderly man to detach his grip and enter the center fray which was biliously moving in both directions.

At that evening's Lynyrd Skynyrd concert, the crowd was massive.  It spilled out of the concert area into the pedestrian walkway.  Those people held their ground and refused to move as hundreds of people attempted to filter through them in an effort to get from point A to point B.  Many in the crowd thought the pedestrians were rude.

All in all, the fair was well done, a lot of fun, a great bargain and much better than I made it out to sound.  It is just more fun to whine and complain about something.  I highly recommend the state fair over all other fairs.

About my superfluous purchase item, it is a sound activated, lighted tee shirt.  It will come in handy for my next Halloween Organ Recital and the Rye Bread Music Festival next summer.  It responds very well to bass and has several gradations of lighting.  Here in this video which I filmed downstairs in my basement I could dance with an elan one can only do when no one else is looking.  Okay, you are but, the lights are off and you can't really see me.  You'll have to come to Rye Bread and get me drunk in order to see the real thing.  Lucky for me I don't drink . . . temperance movement - Puritan that I am . . .

-Malcolm Kogut.

 

Vacation at Mohonk 2013

Mohonk Mountain House Gardens 2013

Mohonk Mountain House Gazebos 2013

Turkey Vulture

A Turkey Vulture near the Eagle Cliff hiking trail above Humpty Dumpty at Mohonk Preserve. 

Toast To the Ta Ta's

I recently attended a wine tasting event which was a fundraiser and promotion for breast cancer awareness. 

One of my sisters died from breast cancer which metastasized to her brain.  After she first discovered a lump she was scared and didn't go to see a doctor for over a year.  She first decided to pray it away.

So ladies, get those things checked.  Don't be embarrassed.  Don't be afraid.  Don't wait and see if it goes away.  Many forms of breast cancer are completely curable if caught early enough. 

For those of you who are religious and wish to pray over it, consider this - maybe God will cure you by sending you to a doctor.  Even Jesus referred people to other experts.  In Luke 17: 12-14 Jesus told ten lepers to go see the priest.  Priests in those days were experts at diagnosing the vast variety of skin ailments since so many people went to them for healing. 

In those days where skin disorders were very common there was a rabid, foaming at the mouth hysteria about leprosy.  Mostly it was the Christians who had skin disorders because they refused to use the public toilets.  Instead, they opted to void in designated fields for purposes of privacy and humility.  They then walked back to the ritual bath area, often barefoot and tracking with them microbes from the fecal infested field.  They then got into a bath that 500 people ritually cleansed themselved in before them.  That germ infested water would go up their noses, in their eyes, mouths, ears and worse yet, into open cuts and scrapes.  It is ironic that the religious zeal for cleanliness was the cause of their many disorders.  Indeed, cleanliness was next to Godliness because it got you closer to God by killing you.

Back to the Ta Ta's.  There is no shame in developing breast cancer.  On the contrary, when you beat it, you will be both a hero and inspiration for others.  If the worse possible diagnosis befalls you, still, don't feel bad or blame yourself or God.   Keep your head up high and tell people not to feel sorry for you.   Feeling sorry for someone is pity, not compassion.  Pity puts one in a stance of looking down upon the sick one.  Compassion (with - suffering) puts one side by side.  The only healing possible in this world of medical miracles is the ability to accept one’s death even as one fights to hang on to life.  With this emotional or spiritual healing comes hope.  With this attitude comes compassion.  With this inner peace comes resurrection of life. 

Have you checked your Ta Ta's today?  If you did, shout it from the roof tops.  Tell your mom, sister, daughter, aunt, neighbor, friend.  Whether you find a lump or not, whether you live or die, you have the power to save many lives.   Be a hero.

Now, men . . .

http://www.nationalbreastcancer.org/breast-self-exam

Tendonitis, Playing the Piano and Skiing

I recently wrote a blog about the prevention and cure for tendonitis where I opined that working on your piano or typing technique can improve other activities such as skiing.  Someone called me to task on that comment and challenged me to explain.

It is not that piano playing and skiing are that much related as much as the physics behind them is the same.  The concepts in common are gravity, alignment (kinematic chains) and reactions to actions.

One of the most common injuries to a skier is a torn ACL (anterior cruciate ligament).  It happens simply when the femur and tibia are not properly aligned and the torque doesn't go through the bones but is transferred onto the tiny yet powerful ACL.  The ACL is very strong when properly aligned but break that alignment and it is as weak as a piece of paper.

Every movement has equal and opposite movements.  In playing the piano the pianist has to play down and thusly he is required to have an up motion.  The muscles to make the arm go up are much stronger than the arms which make us go down because to fall down, no muscle is required.  The pianist also goes up and down the keyboard so in order to play left he has to go right.  Here is why:

If I were to swing a tennis racquet, I would toss the ball in the air and swing my arm backward, then swing forward to hit the ball.  To swing a baseball bat or golf club, I would do the same.  When I swim, in order to stroke, my arm goes behind me, then up and in front of me, then down and behind me.  If I were to swat a fly I would raise the swatter before descending down to smoosh its target.  If I were to slap your face, I wouldn't start with my palm on your face.  I would swing backward then forward across your cheek (and you'll let me do it seven times seventy times then turn the other cheek).

If I wanted to jump into the air, I would bend my knees and sink a little to the ground then propel myself upward.  If I were standing on a glass floor and wanted to break it.  I would jump up and keep my knees bent until I was close to the glass, then extend my knees and feet into the surface for maximum impact.

I come from the old school of parallel skiing where I keep my legs together and ski with them as one rather than two legs.  When you ski with your legs or feet apart, you have four edges to worry about and control (dual muscular pulls).  Catching an edge on the snow can cause you to lose balance and fall.  When you ski with your legs parallel, you only have two edges acting as one limb.  The skier always keeps the inside leg a little bit shorter by bending it slightly more.  Both legs and feet have to be turning together in the same direction at the same time much like all five fingers of a pianist  SHOULD only go in one direction at a time.  The skier needs to have his torso and head perfectly aligned and balanced in one chain.

The parallel turn is accomplished not just by jumping or grinding your edges into the snow but by un-weighing yourself.  When turning, there is a bend at the hip and the legs are extended to the right.  You can experience this, sort of, if you stand sideways about four feet from a wall, lean toward the wall with your left hand so that you are at an oblique angle.  All your weight should be in your right leg (inside the foot-radial side) and the left leg is parallel.  At tremendous forces the edge is digging into the ice (if you ski in the east) and snow (if you ski out west).

That is kind of what a turn feels like but not as static.  This is also a left turn.  As you turn left by leaning into the inside right ski edge, your body will feel the momentum and you would then slightly tuck both knees up and shift your legs to the other side but when you extend your legs so that your skis go down, you lean into the inside of the left ski edge:  These are equal and opposite motions, with perfect alignment, with both legs going in the same direction at the same time.

This method of un-weighing can look like the skier is jumping in the air but they are actually just extending their legs and shifting weight from right to left.  With balance, momentum, extension and retraction, this keeps him upright and in control.

Also, the skier needs to keep the front of his body always facing down the hill where the fall line is or where gravity is pulling him.  If he deviates from the fall line, there needs to be a lot of adjustments lest he catch an edge resulting in a face plant or yard sale.

It sounds complicated but if you are a parallel skier, it makes total sense.  The skier's whole body can only do one thing at a time, either turn left or right or coast forward.  Many skiers are taught to snowplow which is skiing on the inside edges of both skies at the same time but that isn't skiing.  It is ice making and it puts pressure on the knees and maintains constant flexion of the muscles.  As a novice masters the snowplow they are taught the stem Christie which is one step away from parallel but most skiers don't progress to the next step predominately because the nature of un-weighing the whole body is foreign to many people's concept and it requires a leap of faith.  A shy skier will never move beyond the stem Christie. They lack the confidence that their edge will be there if they un-weigh so they remain advanced beginners or intermediate skiers at best because they don't understand nor trust the concept of a closed-loop kinematic chain. 

Have you ever noticed that after somebody has a heart attack or loses a child or goes through anything really heavy, their outlook can change overnight?  They see life on a more deep level than before.  They tend to think about the bigger things and not care so much about the color their cars are or what clothes are in style.  When your mind and body are at one with the mountain, all the obstacles and gravity melts away.

So, like the pianist whose arm can only go in one direction at a time, the skiers body can only go in one direction at a time.  If his body or legs oppose that, he can still ski, just not well.

For the past twenty years ski makers have been designing parabolic skies which are shaped to promote parallel skiing and it is funny to see people skiing parallel without the un-weighing of their body.  Instead they are rolling the ski from edge to edge.  They still fall because they are trying to control the ground rather than control their body and go with gravity.

When skiing in deep powder or on ice, the skier needs this un-weighing as if they are trying to plunge through a glass floor.  This makes it so that the ski edges can dig in to whatever they are resisting.  Lack of un-weighing is why most skiers cannot ski on ice or in deep powder.  They then complain about the mountain or the conditions. 

A skier who tries to control the ski, control the ground and control gravity, will not be a good skier and can easily hurt themselves.  If they use the ski as an extension of their body and they go with gravity rather than fighting it, they can control everything and it will be effortless because they won't be static and engaging the same muscles all the time.  On the contrary.  Our muscles which aid in us going up are much stronger than our muscles that help us go down (Hamstrings Vs Quads).  Ironically, it is engaging the weaker hamstring which gives the quads a break and allows them to work more efficiently and most importantly - rest.

A pianist who fights with the mechanical nature of a piano will forever be challenged by it and their own bodies and, most likely, injured by it.  The pianist is not the engine to the instrument as much as a conduit to the music that already exists.  Only when the closed-loop kinematic chain of the body is achieved and alignment between body and instrument coalesce into one can a musician become an artist or a skier master the gravity of the mountain.

It is interesting to note that true artists or true prodigies don't know what they are doing.  What they do is simply natural to them.  When they try to explain what they do they get it wrong because they explain how they feel.  Bach, for instance, taught his students to scratch the key in a carrezando technique because what he was feeling when he played was his fingers caressing the keys.  What was really happening was as he was lifting and dropping his arm and moving in and out onto the keys because instinctively, he knew his fingers were different lengths and equalizing them caused micro tension.  The sensation of caressing the keys was a result of his arm moving the fingers.  That is what he felt but caressing the keys was not what he was doing. 

Another thing teachers get wrong is when they tell their students to relax the hand.  They need to relax the correct muscles at the right time.  But that is a topic for another time. 

Original slide on Tendonitis
http://www.slideshare.net/sa/8652ca32b9f25fa5adb94fe916c18599