August 2023 – Auxiliary Memory

Newer Movies for Older Viewers

by James Wallace Harris, 8/30/23

It seems the older we get, the pickier we get.

This weekend our friend Janis came to stay with Susan and me. We always watch movies together but picking them has always been problematic. Getting three people to agree on anything takes a bit of time. To make matters worse, Susan hates picking out movies for group watching. It’s one of her pet peeves to have to sit and watch movie previews and then discuss which ones to see. The older we all get, the more set in our ways we’ve become.

It usually falls to me to go through all the streaming services and find a selection for the three of us to choose from. I enjoy the challenge. I think I’m getting good at knowing what Susan and Janis will like.

Susan likes feel-good movies and comedies. Janis likes thrillers and trendy films reviewed on NPR. I like old movies which Susan sometimes will watch, but Janis’s dislikes. I’ve gotten sick of thrillers which Janis loves. Susan loves romantic comedies which I sometimes enjoy but Janis seldom picks. I love westerns but they both dislike that genre. Susan and I dislike mysteries, but Janis seems partial to them. We all hate franchise films, especially ones from Marvel and DC. We all like Pixar films. Susan likes Disney animation, and I do sometimes, but not Janis. I love good accurate historical dramas which appeal to Susan and Janis rarely. We all three like little feel-good films from England and Australia. We emphatically don’t want to watch horny teenager flicks. Janis likes sophisticated horror films if they’re well-reviewed. Janis has a new guideline she uses for herself that helps me. She wants films to have an IMDB rating of > 7.00. That has worked out well for all of us.

Even with all these conflicting tastes we did find two pictures that we all enjoyed enough to consider both movie nights a success. They were: Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret and Where the Crawdads Sing. Both movies were coming of age stories about young girls. Both were based on successful books. I think I’ll remember for the future to look for films based on well-regarded novels. Both books were set around the same time, 1969 and 1970, which the three of us remember well.

I think both films appealed to the three of us because of characterization rather than plot, although I admired the plot of Where the Crawdads Sing. That might be another clue for picking movies next time. Where the Crawdads Sing is a murder mystery that involves violence and rape, subjects that normally would have kept us from watching. Kya is a girl that must raise herself from an incredibly early age. That was a more compelling story than the murder mystery aspect. Margaret’s story is sweet and universal.

Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret is also about religion, and I found that particularly intriguing. Margaret’s father is Jewish and her mother a former Christian, and they decide to Margaret decide about religion when she grows up. But after the family moves to a new home causing Margaret to face several stressful changes in her life starting the sixth grade, she begins talking to God. The movie brings up a lot of philosophical questions about religion but doesn’t answer them. That didn’t dissatisfy me, but I wanted to talk about that with Susan and Janis. But they didn’t want to, and I assume most movie viewers don’t want to go there either. But didn’t Margaret become happier once she gave up on God? Was that the message?

Kya in Where the Crawdads Sing is a retelling of the Tarzan myth. What happens is hard to believe, but I accepted the various rationales the story gave. It’s an incredibly positive story. However, I thought it interesting that this was another story where a white male of a certain stereotype was used for the villain. Now this stereotype is based on plenty of real-world statistics, and I found him believable. Too believable. However, it makes me wonder about things I read in the news about problems that boys and young men are having. And if I were a young girl watching these kinds of films, I’d grow up terrified of boys and men.

Where the Crawdads Sing (Rotten Tomatoes: 35% Critics, 96% Audience, IMDB: 7.2)

Are You There God? It’s Me Margaret (Rotten Tomatoes: 99% Critics, 95% Audience, IMDB: 7.4)

Susan and Janis have no problem finding movies on their own, but it’s getting exceedingly difficult for me to find movies I’ll sit and watch by myself. I really enjoy watching television and movies with other people, and that’s partly because if I’m watching with someone else, I don’t get restless and turn off the TV. But I think Susan and Janis, both find it easier to watch what they want by themselves. Is that a gender thing?

I know the older I get the more intolerant I feel towards movies and TV shows. When I was young, I’d watch shows that my parents would tell me were stupid. That hurt my feelings, but I know what they meant now.

I did find one movie on my own that captivated me — Dial 1119, a low-budget black-and-white film from 1950. It dealt with a crazed killer that seems too familiar to what we see on the news today. The host Eddie Muller of TCM’s Noir Alley said in the intro that America was just starting to take notice of men going on rampage shootings when this film was made.

So that was three good movies for me this weekend.

JWH

Are Women Wanting the Dirty Jobs Men Don’t Want?

by James Wallace Harris, 8/17/23

[This is a repost after WordPress deleted the original.]

Yesterday YouTube offered me a video of two young women milling a 24′ rough log with a Wood-Mizer LT15 portable sawmill. It was fascinating. Yet, I wondered why two beautiful young women were milling a log. I figured these were just unique young women. Then YouTube offered me two more videos of women milling logs. Is this a new trend? I love watching videos of people making things and using machinery. And even though I’m 71 I still love looking at pretty women, so I’m not complaining about anything, especially not gender roles. (Although, don’t tell my wife, she might laugh at me watching pretty girls mill lumber.) I try not to be sexist but was I sexist because I assumed that some jobs were only going to appeal to men and was surprised at seeing these videos? Obviously, the videos showed me I was wrong — once again. Are you surprised?

I’m reminded of two sociological trends in the news over the past couple of years. One, is a lot of dirty jobs once done by men are going unfulfilled. Two, men are rejecting the job market in general, and some say it’s because of competition from women. One report says six million men between the ages of 25 and 54 are choosing to stay out of the work market.

I find YouTube to be a fun way of sampling what’s going on around the world. I’m seeing a lot of videos showing women doing things that once only men like doing. I think that’s great. However, I don’t know if YouTube is an accurate way to gather statistics or not. It could be women like to make videos more than men, or they feel doing something different will get more viewers. What percentage of women want to go into physically demanding jobs once considered only for males?

There seems to be millions of people, especially young people hoping to make a living producing videos. I know they must churn out content at a furious pace and do everything they can to do to get people to watch them. One thing that gets clicks is thumbnails pictures with pictures of pretty girls and clickbait titles.

At Lumber Capital Log Yard, Emerald and Jade are daughters in a family lumber business and milling lumber is something they like doing and are good at it. My guess is Emerald is the one who wanted a video channel, and she had an obvious interesting subject to film. That she and her sister are pretty enough to get into the movies is beside the point. The real interest of the videos is milling logs. But how many of their 150,000 subscribers are women, and how many of them will be inspired to go into the lumber industry?

I do worry about their attire for another reason. Men would be wearing protective clothing, hardhats, gloves, and goggles. And if male workers had beautiful long hair like the sisters, they’d tie it up while working around whirling industrial equipment. I assume the girls could be dressed differently for video days than when they aren’t on camera doing their work. But I could also be wrong here too, and women just want to wear whatever they like. I wonder what OSHA would say? If women take over dirty jobs, will how they do those jobs be different from how men did them?

This does make me wonder about gender roles. Men have always focused on their masculine attributes and hid their feminine side. And it used to be women did the opposite. Now women are displaying both openly and it’s upsetting some men. Several current studies are claiming women aren’t interested in men that can’t compete or keep up with them, and this is upsetting a percentage of men. Other studies are showing that some men don’t even want to try to compete in the workforce anymore. While other studies are showing women starting to dominate certain professions and men have stopped going into them. Those were mostly professional jobs. It was assumed that heavy manual labor would be the last bastion of male workers. That might not be true. Are there women wanting to work in mines, sewers, foundries, construction sites, etc.? I’m fine with that, but will society be fine with it? Politically, things are getting very weird.

And these changes aren’t just happening in the U.S. I’m seeing videos from around the world where women are doing all kinds of jobs or getting into extreme sports which used to only involve men. I’m reminded of a book I read years ago, When Everything Changed: The Amazing Journey of American Women From 1960 to the Present by Gail Collins. Back in 1960, people looked for jobs in the newspaper, and openings were listed in two sections: Men Wanted and Women Wanted — jobs were mostly divided by gender. I’ve seen a lot of change in the last sixty years, and Collins chronicles those work changes in detail. We might be getting close to the end of any gender division of labor.

Since I’m a science fiction fan, I like to extrapolate trends. What will things be like in twenty years? We’re obviously undergoing major social/gender transformation. Where will it take us? I’m all for women doing whatever they want, but it worries me that men can’t seem to handle this transition. What kind of backlash will they cause? The current political pendulum swinging to the right will get involved in this issue. How will it play out?

I’m quite envious of the young women who mill the lumber. I’m 71 and can’t lift shit anymore. I had hernia surgery last year, and I feel downright wimpy and weak. I’m overly impressed with the woman in the third video who is building a cabin on a cliff all by herself. I’m jealous of the young of any gender who have the stamina to do arduous work. I would never say someone should be restricted to the kind of work they do, but weird things are happening in society, and I wonder if some will.

I’m surprised by all the changes I’ve seen in my lifetime and will continue to see. Start watching YouTube, you might be surprised by what you find.

JWH

Could Capitalism Work Without Advertising?

by James Wallace Harris, August 22, 2023

I hate advertisements, yet ads are essential in our economy. But are they really? I’m wondering if capitalism could succeed without ads. I don’t want to put people and corporations out of business by conducting a war against ads, but I want to arrange my life, so I never see them.

We now live in an era where most of the digital content we consume is free, but I hate the price of free when it means looking at ads. What percentage of content providers would go under if they couldn’t sell ads? From what I can tell there are a lot of desperate companies out there barely staying afloat by cramming in even more ads. At some point, everyone will become like me and decide to avoid all content that comes with ads.

I gave up listening to the radio in the early 1970s because I just couldn’t stand the ads. I just switched to buying LPs, CDs, and now Spotify and Apple Music.

I stopped watching movies on TV after TCM, HBO, Blockbusters, and Netflix offered ad free alternative.

The only way I can watch a television show is on streaming services without ads or by using YouTube TV’s DVR where I can scan over the ads.

I’m so sick of web page ads that I want to stop reading web pages or using apps like Flipboard or Feedly.

I’m so aggravated at sponsored ads on Google that I don’t trust the search engine anymore. Even the results not marked sponsored are usually aimed to sell me something. Google should have a little check box on its input line that says, “I’m buying” and if it’s not checked just give me the information I want.

I love The New York Times but reading it is getting more annoying because of the ads. It seems like if I’m paying, I shouldn’t have to view ads. I’m now looking for alternate sources for daily news.

I’m absolutely addicted to YouTube but if they didn’t offer an ad free version, I’d be going cold turkey.

I love shopping online. And when I want to buy something, I do plenty of research, so I’d be open to visiting sites that promoted their products. But unless I want to buy a hedge trimmer, I don’t want to see anything about hedge trimmers.

You’d think corporations would have thought up a more efficient way to promote their products. Do people really buy Cokes because they just saw an ad? Just how much compulsive buying goes on?

Searching engines should be for learning about things.

We should have shopping engines for when we’re ready to buy something.

JWH

p.s. – WordPress ate my last post about women milling lumber. Some people saw it, but it’s disappeared. That’s annoying, especially since I can’t figure out how it happened.

The Personal Insights Found in Watching the YouTube Meme Videos: 10 Albums I’ve Played the Most

by James Wallace Harris

There’s a meme challenge going on YouTube over the past couple of weeks for YouTubers who have channels devoted to collecting albums — What are the ten albums you’ve played the most? Some YouTubers take that to mean over their entire lifetime while others choose to interpret it in various other ways. No one seems to be able to answer the question asked, and I won’t be able to either. I’m going to give ten albums I played the most in the 20th century, and four I’ve played the most in this century. But in all honesty, the ten from the past century were played far more than any this century.

This is an almost impossible task. It challenges those who take up the task to push their memories to their limits. It also reveals delusions we have about what we think we know about ourselves. And it shows how we change over time, even when we think we haven’t. And to be completely honest, we fudge on the selection in favor of what we want to be remembered remembering. Even if you aren’t a record collector, try to adapt the task to something you love, and then give an honest answer.

One thing I found startling about watching these videos is how unique and different the lists are. Humans are truly diverse creatures. When I was growing up in the 1960s there were only three TV channels and AM Top 40 radio. It was easy to find other people who like the same TV shows and songs that you did. That’s almost impossible now. Any Top 10 list you make will be as unique as your fingerprints.

I’ve watched several of the videos and so far, I don’t think there’s been any overlap of albums. Isn’t that wild? And several YouTubers listed ten albums I’ve never played, and some listed albums I’ve never even heard of before.

Visit YouTube to watch some of these videos.

I believe it’s delusional to think we know which albums we’ve played the most if we only go by what feels true. I’m sure people might think “I’ve played that album a million times” it’s obvious that such a statement is hyperbole. I’m not even sure its within reason to say, “I’ve played that song a thousand times,” even though I’ve thought it true about “Like A Rolling Stone” by Bob Dylan.

I doubt anyone has kept a diary of when they played an album and have trusted statistics. But that’s what’s fun about this challenge, trying to analyze a pattern that spans a lifetime. Google tells me there’s been 21,183 days since I started buying records in 1966. I was given a few between 1962 and 1965, but I don’t really remember them. Google also says there were 3,026 weeks, and 58 years in that period. There is no album I’ve played every week, but I’m confident there are albums I played at least once a year. Knowing those numbers will help me verify my memory.

I’ve been buying albums since 1966 and I have owned between 3,000 and 4,000. But making even that guess is psychologically revealing. I do know years ago when I ripped my CDs to MP3s that I ended up with over 1,900 of them. I’ve bought many since. I think I’ve bought around the same number of LPs but that’s only a guess. LP buying was dominant for about twenty years, as compared to thirty-eight years of buying CDs. Until the advent of streaming, I often bought 2-4 new albums a week, and during my LP buying years, I often bought used LPs, so that number was higher.

My record playing habit has always been to search for albums I love, play them over and over for days or weeks, and then burn out on them. However, I’d say less than 1 in 10 albums I bought excited me enough to play them over and over like that. Looking at the numbers, I’m guessing I’ve only loved about three hundred albums out of all those I bought, and of that three hundred, only about 30-50 are ones I like to play all the way through when I play them. That means I need to figure out which ten out of fifty I played the most.

The odds are some of the ten from the 20th century are the actual albums I played the most.

Playing around with numbers, I’m going to set my rule of thumb to thinking any pre-2000 album I played more than fifty times is a possibility, and any post-2000 album I’ve played more than thirty times.

20th Century

I know I’ve told people I’ve played “Like a Rolling Stone” by Bob Dylan at least 1,000 times. That’s only playing it once a day for three years, out of the possible 58 years since I first heard it in July 1965. But if I press my memory hard, I know I never played it daily for three years. And I know I haven’t played it even weekly. But I’ve bought Highway 61 Revisited and Blonde on Blonde twice on vinyl, once on CD, and once on SACD. I’m confident I’ve played those two albums once a year, and more than likely two or more times each year. That means I’ve easily played them more than one hundred times since they came out.

Now it’s easy to pick the next two albums I played the most, since they are both from the 1960s, and I’ve been playing them ever since. In the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s I played Everybody Knows This is Nowhere by Neil Young whenever I needed an emotional boost. It was like cocaine. Playing it just pumped me up, and I played the hell out of it. But I don’t play it much anymore. “Cowgirl in the Sand” is on my standard playlist, so I listen to it regularly.

The Secret Life of J. Eddy Fink by Janis Ian made me a life-long Janis Ian fan. I still play it regularly, and I love hearing the whole album. I even bought it again on vinyl several years ago when I got back into vinyl. (I’ve sold my entire vinyl collection more than once.)

Here’s where the YouTube meme becomes more challenging. My main clue is I’ve had this habit of buying an album and playing it repeatedly until I was tired of it. For many albums that was once. But for some that would be a week or two. In rare exceptions it might be a month. It was always until I found another album, one I had to hear in repeat mode too. I know I used to drive anyone living with me crazy because this habit. All ten of the albums I picked were ones I couldn’t stop listening to for weeks.

In the 1970s, The Allman Brothers Band at Fillmore East and Born to Run by Bruce Springsteen were those albums I played the most. And I got to see the Allman Brothers live in 1971 before Duane died, and Springsteen live in 1975, during the Born to Run tour. I’m still playing both albums after all these years.

After I burn out on an album I could go weeks, months, or years before I played it again. The best albums would be gotten out again and put on repeat play for a while again. I’m sure I’ve had at least fifty albums I’ve played repeated for weeks. I love soundtrack albums, and Tubular Bells and Gattaca are the ones I’ve played the most, so I’m going to represent all my jazz and soundtrack albums with these two albums.

For most albums I never played them whole but repeated played one or two songs. Boy did I love CDs and having a remote. And streaming made this even easier. I have one Spotify playlist of just songs I love that I put on random play because I love hearing them over and over.

But for the 10 Albums I’ve Played the Most meme I’m pushing my brain to remember only those albums I love playing whole. Gypsy by Gypsy was a double album, but I would play it all the way through almost every time I played it, especially after I got the CD. But to be honest, I only play the first side of What’s Going On by Marvin Gaye — however, that one side is the most perfect side of any album I know.

21st Century

I think many YouTubers didn’t want to tax their memories, so they only pick ten albums they play the most currently or in recent years. I think that’s a cheat. The ten albums I picked for the 20th century are for the fulfillment of the meme. I just can’t let people think I don’t listen to contemporary music. The next four albums are ones I play whole, and over and over since I got them.

I bought young in all the wrong ways by Sara Watkins on LP a couple of years ago when I was giving vinyl another chance. (I’ve abandoned it yet again.) I loved playing young in all the wrong ways every night when I went to bed. I did this for weeks. I have several albums by Sarah Jaffe, but The Body Knows is the one I play most. I still play both albums regularly.

My new obsession is Kings of Leon, and When You See Yourself is the one, I play the most. I have several of their albums. I just love Adele, but 30 was special. I love to play it loud. Well, I love to play everything very loud. Loud for me is eighty-five decibels.

And most YouTubers were emphatic that they were not picking the Top Ten Best Albums. The meme really is about the albums we play the most. But it’s hard to pick a single album you played the most from artists or groups where you love many of their albums. For this meme, the ten selected don’t necessarily mean they are from my favorite artists or groups either.

I know back in the 1960s I played Bob Dylan, The Byrds, and The Beatles the most. But I stopped playing The Beatles as much since. I’ve had two or three Beatles playing jags in the last 50 years, but I never stopped playing Dylan or The Byrds. However, I don’t think I’ve ever played any Byrds album more than fifty times, but it’s close.

To appease my memory and maybe lie to myself mathematically I’m going to pick albums I’m the most emotionally addicted to, the ones I know I return to the most because they sooth my soul. They are the true album forms of heroin. And this might be the solution many YouTubers chose.

There are individual songs I’ve played more than any album by far. Two, “Fresh Air” and “What About Me” by Quicksilver Messenger Service were on two different albums. And they were the only songs on the albums I liked. So, I hate to use those albums for this meme. I could use a best of compilation, but I would consider that cheating on the game too.

There are albums I’m sure that I’ve played more than fifty times that I don’t want to list in my ten. The first album I bought with my own money mowing lawns was the soundtrack to Our Man Flint with music composed by Jerry Goldsmith. I just don’t listen to it anymore but back when I first bought it, I wore it out.

It’s hard to be honest answering questions like “What are the ten albums you played the most?” Like I said, I guess there are at least forty other albums that I might have played as much. I hate that I shouldn’t mention them, but I’ve already cheated by giving four albums for this century that I played the most.

If you’re curious, here’s my Spotify playlist of songs I play the most.

JWH

Replacing Classic Novels

by James Wallace Harris, 8/12/13

Most bookworms just want to be entertained. They know their tastes are so individualistic that no friend or authority can predict what they will like. However, teachers and literary scholars like to think that certain books should be read, and a tiny fraction of readers are willing to read books because they have a great reputation. We feel reading the classics makes us a better person.

There is no FDA like agency that officially rates books as choice or prime. So, what makes a classic novel? The common assumption is novels that survive the test of time are the real classics. However, you can go on Amazon and order a lot of books from the 19th century that no one considers classics. Some people consider books that are taught in school or college to be the classics. And there is some merit to that, but literary works that get taught are also subject to the whims of pop culture, and English departments.

I mention all this, because I read “8 Overrated Literary Classics and 8 Books to Read Instead” by Jeffrey Davies, especially since it throws four of my favorites under the bus: On the Road by Jack Kerouac, Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, The Catcher in the Rye by J. D. Salinger, and Little Women by Louisa May Alcott.

Of course, this is clickbait, but I’ve seen this kind of essay before. A couple other examples are “13 Overrated Literary Classics, and What to Read Instead” by J. W. McCormack and “9 Overrated Classics — And What to Read Instead” by Zoraida Córdova.

I understand why young people rebel and want to overthrow the reading lists of the past, especially a past dominated by white male writers. And sure, sometimes these articles are just giving suggestions as to something different to read. But other times, I do feel the writers just hate the classics they are demoting. I often see On the Road and The Catcher in the Rye listed in these literary rebellions. (A hilarious generational attack on The Catcher in the Rye is the novel King Dork by Frank Portman)

What I would like to propose are rules for this game. If you want to oust a literary classic, you need to provide a proper substitute. All too often, these writers offer alternatives that are just their personal favorites, and usually something from recent decades. Classics have specific qualities that any substitute should have too. They include:

A snapshot of history – time, place, and subculture
Innovation in writing style and techniques
A philosophical or psychological insight

In other words, classic novels offer a view of everyday life in the past, even if it’s inaccurate, slanted, or distorted. That’s why I’m against publishers cleaning up aspects of older novels to make them politically correct for modern woke minds. We need to know both the good and bad about how we were. No censoring or whitewashing the past by substituting novels that agree with your moral and ethical sensibilities.

Classic novels supplement history books to build mental models of the past in our heads. Removing any one of them takes pieces of the puzzle away from the collective images we’re building of our cultural heritage and history.

If you’re serious about offering replacements because you feel an existing classic work doesn’t do the job well enough, then suggest a novel that offers a better view of the same time and setting. One that is more insightful.

The trouble is, doing just this is extremely hard. Readers have spent decades and centuries winnowing out the best novels. You might dislike novels for the views they show, but finding good replacements takes a lot of work and reading.

I would suggest, instead of trying to replace specific classic novels, you offer supplements instead that expand or enhance the classics. For example, The Catcher in the Rye (1951) and On the Road (1957) are about alienated youth in America before the youth rebellion of the 1960s. We need more novels about kids growing up in America in the 1940s and 1950s to expand on the views those two famous classics give. I would suggest Horseman, Pass By and The Last Picture Show by Larry McMurtry and The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, among others.

The challenge would be to find novels written near the time and setting covered, ones that have been forgotten but are worth resurrecting and remembering. There is something more authentic about novels written by people who lived in the time of the novels as opposed to later novels that are historical fiction.

Few novels are truly contemporary. On the Road was set in the 1940s, but was written in the early 1950s, and published in 1957. It takes a certain number of years to get the perspective and write things down. Breakfast at Tiffany’s was published in 1958, but about 1943. And it’s not the early sixties we see in the film, and neither is the plot or characters. Holly Golightly is a lot closer to Neal Cassidy than most people realize. She is another alienated youth from the 1940s, and another supplement for The Catcher in the Rye.

I understand why young readers dislike older novels. I can understand why they want to promote their favorite stories as classics. But I don’t think it’s an ethical idea to suggest they should replace the older classics, especially with newer novels.

They need to decide which novels from the eras in which they lived paint a worthwhile picture of those times and places, and then promote them as the classics that represent those settings and characters.

If these essay writers need a hook to promote the books they love, please don’t throw the books under the bus that other people love. I’d suggest being straight forward and creating titles like: “The Best Books about Miami in the 1980s.” Or “Novels About People Who Lived Down the Street from Jane Austen.” Or “Characters Who Lived While Jack and Neal Were On the Road.” Or “Novels That Louise May Alcott Read That We Should Read Too.”

JWH