Sometimes it amazes me how easy it is to become jaded, to allow the extraordinary to become at best commonplace and at worst unnoticed. 39 years ago today Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed the Lunar Module Eagle on the surface of the moon. This achievement, in my opinion one of the more amazing of human accomplishments, may get a 30 second mention on the news this evening.

I know, the world has more pressing concerns. The middle east is poised to turn into even more of a mess than it already is. The US economy is in a nose dive. Houses are being forclosed on at an amazing clip. And it goes on and on….

Today, just a minute or two, stop and think about what an accomplishment it was on so many different levels when the words below were being sent between Houston, Texas and the Sea of Tranquility on the moon.

Aldrin: Altitude-velocity light. 3 1/2 down, 220 feet, 13 forward . forward. Coming down nicely. 200 feet, 4 1/2 down. 5 1/2 down. 5 1/2 down, 9 forward. That’s good. 120 feet. 100 feet, 3 1/2 down, 9 forward. Five percent. Okay. 75 feet. There’s looking good. Down a half, 6 forward.

Mission control (Duke): 60 seconds

Aldrin: Lights on … Down 2 1/2. Forward. Forward. Good. 40 feet, down 2 1/2. Kicking up some dust. 30 feet, 2 1/2 down. Faint shadow. 4 forward. 4 forward. Drifting to the right a little. Okay. Down a half.

Mission Control (Duke): 30 seconds

Armstrong: Forward drift?

Aldrin: Yes. Okay. Contact light. OK, engine stop.

Armstrong: Houston, Tranquility Base here. The Eagle has landed.

Mission Control (Duke): Roger, Tranquility. We copy you on the ground. You got a bunch of guys about to turn blue. We’re breathing again. Thanks a lot.

Sixty three years ago today the world’s first atomic bomb was detonated in Los Alamos, New Mexico. These days, people like to jump up and down and talk about how September 11th changed everything; take a moment to think about how much was changed by this event and the subsequent decision to use these weapons against Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

This test - codename Trinity - moved Dr. Robert Oppenheimer to quote from the Bhagavad Gita. The citation is usually shortened to the second sentence, but it deserves to be read in full:

“If the radiance of a thousand suns were to burst at once into the sky, that would be like the splendor of the mighty one. Now I am become Death, destroyer of worlds.”

The National Archives has in it’s collection an eyewitness account of this event by Nobel Laureate Dr. Luis Alvarez. As someone who grew up during the sabre-rattling years of the cold war, I find the description to be detached; the implications anything but.

After the hemispherical cap had emerged through the cloud layer tone could see a cloud of smoke about 1/3 the diameter of the “parachute” connecting the bottom of the hemishpere with the undercast. This had very much the appearance of a large mushroom.

Early last tuesday I had the misfortune to be trapped in a hospital waiting room with the local (WEWS Channel 5 out of Cleveland) morning show. I say misfortune not because I was waiting for someone in the hospital - it was an outpatient procedure and everything turned out just fine and dandy - but more in the sense that I had to sit through the load of codwallop that was being served up by the credulous hosts of “5 In the AM” or whatever they call their goofy show.

Now, I know that the local morning shows aren’t known for their engaging intellectual content; mainly they seem to revolve around what clothes you should wear, a new receipe or two, and (if you’re lucky) an interview with a local author, sports figure, or the like. I’m willing to accept that fact; it’s not necessarily my cup of tea, but then again I don’t watch all that much TV anyways. That is, unless I’m a captive audience.

So what was it that drove me to the point of wanting to gouge my eyes out? Why, it was “Mary Ann The Ghostbuster”. Nope, not making that one up. That is actually what this woman calls herself…and that is also what she is called by the softball tossing crew at what bills itself as “Newschannel 5″. Yup. In-depth, investigative reporting there.

For at least 10 minutes - I lost track of time due to the high level of innanity pouring from the TV - this woman blathered on about ghosts and spirits in response to “questions” from viewers. I put questions in quotes, because in many cases Mary Ann was able to create her own questions from the simplest of caller statements.

For example, I paraphrase one exchange (unfortunately this stellar paranormal work does not seem to be recorded or documented anywhere so you’ll have to rely on my memory):

Caller: I have an old house - it was built in the 1870’s - and occassionally I feel and hear strange things.

Ghostbuster: Oh, that’s the spirt of a lady. You have steps that go down to a cellar?

Caller: Yes!

Ghostbuster: And the cellar has a dirt floor….

Caller: Yes!

Ghostbuster: She’s harmless…

And it went on and on like that. This was near the low end of the scale as far as cold reading goes - I took it as a fantasy prone person with an overactive imagination coupled with a pair of credulous local “news” people and a dozen or so callers who wanted to play the ghost game. For example, in the recreated section above I’m not all that impressed that she managed to “hit” the fact that a 138 year old house had a cellar or that the cellar had a dirt floor. Wow. That’s as impressive as managing to guess that a house built in 2005 has central air.

Initially I just dismissed this whole episode as someone starved for attention appearing on local TV. But then I did a bit of research and discovered that - in a profile on www.clevelandseniors.com - Mary has a business as a paranormal investigator. Why she even gives classes! I’m not sure what the classes are in…but she gives them. She even clears houses! And if the Indians would let her hold their legal papers she could clear the curse that’s on them! (You really should read the profile - it’s chock full of all sorts of exciting knowledge of the paranormal - it even covers their relationship with Cleveland sports teams).

You know, given her amazing abilities you have to wonder why Mary Ann isn’t all over the Randi Million Dollar Challenge….she definitely seems to think she has a demonstrable talent. Having followed Randi’s blog for some time know, though, I know that was asked why she hadn’t applied for the challenge there would be a million reasons/excuses. I’ll cut right through all those and go with the most obvious though; there are no ghosts, so there is nothing to talk to, exorcise, clear, or do whatever it is that she lays claim to doing as a “Ghostbuster”. To repeat, I unequivicably state that based on all available evidence THERE ARE NO GHOSTS. No matter what you want to believe; no matter what amazingly convincing anecdotal evidence you have; and no matter what Sting sang about in the song Spirts in the Material World.

You really have to wonder about people who believe this crap. How many of them are true believers and how many of them have that Mulder X-Files “I Want to Believe” thing going? How many of them just go along “for entertainment purposes only”? The one moderately encouraging thing I took away from my time in the waiting room with this garbage on TV was the fact that - with the exception of one woman - everyone else seemed to think Mary was full of it as well. This wasn’t a scientific poll; I was going mainly by the rolling of eyes, head shakes, and (on one occasion) laughter following one of the “Ghostbusters” more ridiculous statements.

To close us out, I will admit that the amazingly credulous writer who penned the article on ClevelandSeniors.com got at least one thing right in her writeup:

It is hard to believe the stories she tells, unless you sit across from her and hear her tell them. There is something about her that you want to believe, even if you’re not sure if you do.

She does not try to convince you. She just tells the stories. And there are a lot of them and each one is more interesting than the last.

Yeah, I’m sure the stories are each more interesting than the last. And I’m sure they’re all just as true.

Early in May, Beth managed to get me all fired up about this editorial (Evolution and it’s Critics) in the Akron Beacon Journal. I think she did it knowing that at some point in time I’d get pissed off and write a letter back to the editor about it. Which, of course, is exactly what happened. Sometimes it’s tough being so predictable.

Fortunately, my letter didn’t get published. I say “fortunately” not because I didn’t want to get it published, I’m as narcissistic as the next guy and don’t mind seeing my name in print. Fortunately because there were a number of other writers who wrote in to castigate both the content of the editorial and the author himself. I’m not talking about an Ad Hominem here, folks, I’m talking about the fact that this particular person has a long history of trying to promote his rather fundamentalist Christian ideas regarding creation in the public schools.

Initially I thought that the bit about “MovieGuide.com” in the original editorial was an honest mistake - however, after reading some of the other editorial in response and researching this individual’s letter writing history I’m more inclined to believe it was an intentional deception meant to appeal to the authority of moiveguide.com to validate Expelled.

One other advantage to not being published is, of course, getting to put it up here. I’m sure they’ll be a point in the future where my ranting will be splashed across the pages of the Beacon Journal, there to be read by dozens if not scores. But until then….

I’d like to respond to the editorial entitled “Evolution and its Critics” by Mr. Robert Lattimer in the 1-May-2008 Beacon Journal.

In direct contrast to what is stated in the editorial, MovieGuide.com does not give Expelled 4 stars - in fact, MovieGuide.com redirects to Hollywood.com. As you would expect, this is a site that is concerned with movie reviews and other Hollywood news. However, a search of the site show no reference to the Expelled movie at this time.

On the other hand, MovieGuide.org does have a review of Expelled. Since the quotes in the editorial match the review on MovieGuide.org I have to assume that this is the site that the author meant instead of MovieGuide.com. A quick visit to MovieGuide.org should be enough to convince any reasonable person that it is not a neutral party; in fact, a statement on the website proclaims that “Movieguide is a ministry dedicated to redeeming the values of the mass media according to biblical principles, by influencing entertainment industry executives and helping families make wise media choices.”

In direct contrast to the author’s statements, unfavorable and unflattering reviews seem to be the norm for Expelled. Reviewers seem to feel that there is an undercurrent of dishonesty in the movie, including quote mining, selective editing, and questionable interview tactics. The website ExpelledExposed.com - a website created by the National Center for Science Education to provide information on the claims made in the movie - provides an extensive list of these reviews.

The author states that “objectivity requires that researchers follow the evidence wherever it leads”; I respectfully suggest that he follow that advice and explore the origins of this film, which is little more than a propaganda piece.

As I write this Todd has a robot called da Vinci somewhere in the area of his mitral valve….if all goes as planned, his mitral valve should be all fixed up mkaing him as good as new (well, as good as Durfee can be - I’ll leave the actual judgement on that score to Heather) within the next few hours.

This heart stuff is beginning to get old. First, we have Dave dropping at work with a cardiac arrest, and now we have Durfee - probably one of the most active and healthy people I know - having to go in and get a mitral valve repaired.

Sure, I had a cardiac workup a few years ago - but fellas, that’s only because I was getting weird muscle pains from riding the bike in a weird posture! OK, there was probably a whole stress component from my last job as well (Beth would probably argue that this was the bulk of the issue), but for the most part it was all my horrible posture on the bike.

The scary bit is that we are all having these issues in our mid-thirties. Makes you wonder if there was something in the water out at old Walsh Jesuit High School, no? Makes my cringe in horror when I think about what’s going to happen to us all 20 years from now.

Todd has approached this whole oredeal rather well. Personally, I would have been completely cranked around the bend knowing that I had to have someone operate on my heart. This is based on experience - I was a nervous wreck when I was having the aforementioned chest pains.

Not Durfee, though. He’s been completely low key and matter-of-fact about it. It’s the same sort of approach Sean used to take, namely, “worry about the shit you can do something about”. It’s been a bit of an inspiration to say the least. Of course, I won’t be telling him that….we’re guys, after all. We don’t do that sort of thing.

More to follow once I talk to Mr. Durfee post-op.