So, I have One-hundred and eleven posts written on this blog. A couple of which are private, so feel free to claim it faulty at this point if you counted them up. I enjoy patterns and numbers, the little significance and stories that I can attach to things. It endears them to me, simultaneously making them easier to remember and more interesting as well.
Sadly, I don't keep all the quirky facts and trivia on brainwave command as I once did. I collect things, as I have mentioned before. I don't remember my first collection (probably coins given to me, in which a dollar felt like wealth untold.) But I remember vividly one in particular when I was twelve-ish. My parents had kept nearly seven years of back issues of Reader's Digest, and I would scour them for interesting tidbits and anecdotes. Many of the ill-tasteful dross went over my head, but I loved amusements and learned small insights into the lives of celebrities and everyday heroes brought to light in the course of a few choice pages.
One lingering side effect of this endeavor is that I have become insufferable when listening to "jokes," I hear the opening and claim, 'Heard it already, the punchline is _____ or near it, correct?' (I wonder if I could use this fickle memory for more useful streams of knowledge, in schoolwork perhaps?). Among the stories I read in these pages, I recall at least three which I particularly liked.
The first was an article written by a former "dipper" or pickpocket. He told of his early training and entry into the trade. Some of the exercises he did were wrapping rubber bands around his fingers to flex, or picking up bricks by the corners using only two fingers. The tone of the article was precautionary, how to defend yourself from predators, especially cute kids who could be hiding a light-fingered knack behind an innocuous smile. He and his sister would work a mall, it was her job to distract the mark while he lifted the wallet, stripped the cash/cards, and returned the empty vessel into the owner's possession. He was caught one day when he was bored with a successful haul and wanted to do one more mark, a challenge this time. The lady had a leather zippered purse and he fumbled it up and was caught. Interesting seeing the game from the perspective of the other, profiteering side of the criminal bargain.
The second was the story of Will Shortz, the New York Times crossword editor and puzzlemaker extraordinaire. The man's story was a wonder - created his own field by the improvised major of studying the construction and history of puzzle-making in college. Mr. Shortz was just a fascinating fellow, I don't think myself alone in admiring his motivation, vision, and success.
The third I had in mind took me a couple of times through the reams of issues to appreciate - it concerned the mental state of a man who decided to stay awake for as long as he could endure. He wrote about his experiment in sleep-deprivation, and the delusions and daydreams which plagued him for the duration. At the beginning of the article, he described a dozed dream in which he was a laboratory rat running through a maze. He cannot stop, cannot rest, he must continue... I don't want that problem. I will go to bed now, just thought I should update this chronicle of my ramblings every so often.
Until the Muse lays me low with a disheartening mental blow,
I shall persevere to scribble my thoughts and make them so.
To manifest an gloriously novel idea on a page,
Only to be informed its origins stretched back to the Middle Age.
Sometimes I pause to query rhetorically, "Is there anything truly new under the sun?
Technology's progresses are merely rearranging of 'What are the limits as to what can be done?' "
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