Ask Roger Anything Archives - Ramblin' with Roger

ARA: understand a technology

lost address book

Arthur, who I’ve possibly never mentioned in the blog ever, notes:

I missed this when you posted it—it’s a busy time of year!—but I have questions:

If you could understand a technology you currently feel that you don’t, what would it be and why?

There is not a single technology that I’ve ever come across that I knew instinctively how to operate. The cliche that people had VCRs with the clock flashing 12:00 was true until I bought another machine and stumbled into figuring it out, or somebody else did; I can’t remember.

We have a DVD player in which we can play DVDs, but we still don’t have a current means of playing VHS tapes, so some things never change.

If you could create a technological solution for something, what would it be? What problem are you trying to “fix”?

The “fix” for my technological needs has been found. Unfortunately, it was established in the world of fictional television. For instance, I want a transporter like the one on Star Trek so I can spend less time getting there and more time enjoying myself. I’d also do a lot more international travel.

On the sitcom Bewitched, Samantha Stevens could instantly clean the house. I’m up for that, but I can’t wiggle my nose. Alas! (And, BTW, Darrin was a jerk for “forbidding” Sam from using her magic to do mundane tasks. )

Old school

What was your favourite technology that’s now obsolete?

It’s a word-processing product. It may have been WordPerfect. I could tell what italics, bold, etc., were embedded in the document and fix them. If you’ve ever seen any of my blog posts that have big gaps or, conversely, run together, know that I tried to fix them, but I can’t see why they’re off. It’s a mystery to me, and if my WordPress did the same thing as the WordPerfect I used to use, that would be nice. I don’t know if WordPerfect exists anymore and if it could be used in this mode.

If you could transport back in time for 30 minutes, where/when would you go, and why? Or, would you rather leave the past in the past?

I would avoid most opportunities to go back in time because changing one thing would likely affect several others. But two things come to mind that I’d alter. 1) I commented on a couple of people in a manner I don’t understand. I would undo that, and that would likely not have any grand negative consequences.

2) I was in Greenwich Village in the late 1970s or early 1980s, talking to somebody on a pay phone; I left my address book there and never retrieved it. It had addresses I needed, and I’ve always been a bit sad about that. So, if I could go back and remember to pick the phone address book off the phone booth shelf, I would do that, and it would make me surprisingly happy.

ARA: newspaper route

“newspapers were wildly profitable”

My first Ask Roger Anything questions come from my dear friend Cecily:

Did you have a newspaper route in your youth?

I had a route delivering the Evening and Sunday Press in Binghamton, NY. I’m not positive of the time frame, but it would have had to have been after July 1965 because I subsequently joined the Capitol Record Club. One of the first things I purchased was Beatles VI, which came out that month.

Moreover, I would have had to have been delivering the paper in December 1966 because my father helped me on Sunday Christmas morning, something he never did before or after.

I didn’t make a whole heck of a lot of money. My route ran from the corner of Oak Street and Clinton at a barbershop to a large apartment complex called the Dwight block on Front Street and McDonald Ave., which surrounded a Front Street store called Henry’s. So monetarily, I did OK on Clinton, took a bath financially on the Dwight block, but did very well on McDonald Ave, from which you can see the Chenango River.

(BTW, the newspaper delivers don’t have to try to collect the money anymore; the newspapers do that.)

I should note that I inherited the route from a guy from my church named Walter Jones, who was a couple of years older than me. He was my parents’ godson. His grandparents, the Whitfields, were my godparents. His aunt (his mother’s sister), Mrs. Hamlin, was the organist at my church and tried to teach me how to play piano.

First Ward

We were all in a very small geographic area. Walter lived on the corner of Everett and Elm, one block from Daniel Dickinson School, which we attended. Trinity AME Zion church was about three blocks from his house and a block from mine.

Not incidentally, I later inherited Walter’s job as a page at the Binghamton Public Library under the guidance of a woman named Beccye Fawcett, who attended my church. I believe that she was the first black librarian in Binghamton.

Walter’s daughter is Amanda Jones, who is a well-regarded composer in the television and film industry.

If so, did you have one of those strapped canvas carriers, especially for Sunday editions?

Yes, I did have one of those, but I seldom used it, and never on Sunday; the thing hurt my shoulder. Instead, as I indicated recently, I often used a shopping cart.

There are reports that even as newspapers are delivered, and fewer are in the carrier, it seems to get HEAVIER!

How can that occur?

I had not heard that, and I can’t find any verification. Based on the last ones I’ve seen, the merged Binghamton newspaper feels unsubstantial even on Sunday. Moreover, newspapers are generally shrinking in width.

CHQ

When my wife and I went to Chautauqua in the summer of 2024, journalist Margaret Sullivan noted that at the end of the 20th century: “At the time, newspapers were wildly profitable because advertisers had few ways to target their potential customers. But competition, first from Craigslist, hurt the bottom. Eventually, Facebook, Google, and others circulated the expensive-to-create news content for free, and this gutted newsrooms.”

Print subscriptions have decreased since 1990, though online subscriptions have been rising.

Here’s some trivia: “The most massive single issue of a newspaper was the 14 September 1987 edition of the Sunday New York Times, which weighed more than 5.4kg (12lb) and contained 1,612 pages.

Based on ads, finding people to deliver the paper has been harder, even as fewer people buy the physical object. Our delivery people are adults with cars because the geographic range of physical subscribers is much larger than when I was young.

Even though it’s not the advertising Mecca it used to be, potential LLCs must still run ads in New York State. The newspaper is still the place for obituaries, especially on Sundays, even though they are expensive and can often be accessed online.

Top/Favorite MOVIES

not boring

Drew from California asked:

Have you made your Top/Favorite MOVIES (so far in your life) list? If so, I’d love to get some good recommendations, as I feel rather “movie-watching deficient” in my lifetime. I do like Rom-Coms and intelligent conversations. Good adventure and sometimes good suspense are also fun to watch.

I find this extraordinarily difficult. For instance, I really liked EEAAO (Everything Everywhere All at Once). But will it stand up to the test of time? I dunno. I remember liking ALTERED STATES (1980) and Z, but they have faded from memory.

Likewise, I was a fan of Jules and Jim (Jules et Jim) (1962), a French film I saw in Binghamton in the late 1960s in a museum theater. It was my favorite foreign film, but I saw a lot of movies, such as Wild Strawberries, that I do not remember well.

That said, I tend to remember and enjoy movies I see in the cinema more than the ones I’ve seen on TV. Seeing a movie again is almost always revelatory. For instance, seeing The Wizard of Oz in 2022 on the big screen was way better than watching it several times on TV.

I like from coms. Is Groundhog Day a rom-com? You could try Love Actually. I like lots of documentaries, but only one of them made this list.

Here’s a list; THE list may never exist.

Casablanca (1942) – saw outdoors at a screening in the late 1970s near Rochester, NY. A great film

Gaslight (1944), which I wrote about, and the word, here.

Rear Window (1954) – I saw it at the Spectrum Theatre in the 1980s. Most excellent and full of suspense.

12 Angry Men (1957) – I wrote about it here

Always on the list

West Side Story (1961) –Some of my favorite music is here. It’s not a great movie – it takes too long to get going, but it was the first grown-up movie I saw.

101 Dalmatians (1961). Possibly the first movie I ever saw in a theater. The lead male adult, Roger, gets to sing “Cruella DeVille.”

The Sound of Music (1965) —My mother had the soundtrack on LP, but I never saw it until the 21st century. It is far better than I expected.

Le Roi de cœur (King of Hearts – 1966) – it played approximately annually at a movie theater in New Paltz, where I went to college.

The Night They Raided Minsky’s (1968)- there is a story here.

Cabaret (1972) – I saw it when it first came out, then a half-century later, both in theaters. It holds up.

Young Frankenstein (1974) – Possibly the funniest movie I ever saw. I had an aisle seat, and I laughed so hard at one point that I was literally rolling in the aisle.

Annie Hall (1977) – I haven’t seen it this century, but I wrote about it in 2007 here.

Being There (1979) – I spent a lot of time defending this film from people who thought it was “boring” and that “nothing happens.”

Airplane! (1980) – It has a character named Roger, played by Kareen Addul-Jabbar. Oh, and other stuff, including the script based on an existing dramatic film.

Who Framed Roger Rabbit (1988)? Well, of course. This was a remarkable technological feat and features a character named Roger.

Baseball

Field of Dreams (1989): I opted for this Kevin Costner baseball film rather than the fine Bull Durham (1988) because it’s sappier, and I totally buy into it.

Do the Right Thing (1989) – probably the first Spike Lee movie I saw.

Groundhog Day (1993) was one of the first items I owned on VHS. It features JEOPARDY! to see annually.

THE IRON GIANT (1999) – I LOVE THIS animated MOVIE

Being John Malkovich (1999) – surreal

Chicago (2002). An old-fashioned musical

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind (2004) is one of the few movies I have seen at home on the list.

The Incredibles (2004): My favorite Pixar film, which I can tell, because it was later on NBC, with all those damn commercials, and I still enjoyed it.

INSIDE OUT (2015) – an emotionally honest film

13th (2016). Documentary about the 13TH Amendment

Hidden Figures (2016) – I wrote about it here

Black Panther (2018) – I wrote about it here

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018) – I mention this here

I am frequently reminded of a line from the 1991 film Grand Canyon, in which the Steve Martin character says: “That’s part of your problem: you haven’t seen enough movies. All of life’s riddles are answered in the movies.” I’m convinced there is some truth to that.

Ask Roger Anything sans pumpkin pie

Dickinson cultivar

From Snopes: “On 23 September 2016, Facebook users began sharing an article which claimed that the pumpkin typically used in pumpkin pie is in fact a multi-squash blend containing little to no pumpkin.” I remember reading about it at some point and shrugging.

As it turns out, the truth is a bit more nuanced. “According to botanists, however, asserting a clear distinction between ‘pumpkin’ and ‘squash’ is difficult because there is no strict botanical definition for pumpkins. Semantically, pumpkins are a type of squash, and the Dickinson cultivar is listed as a pumpkin.”

The pumpkin can you get from a can from Libby’s and other manufacturers is a blend of squash and pumpkin. It’s not the pretty pumpkins you expect to see on porches at Halloween, but they’re arguably more edible.

The topic is no big deal to me because I’m not a big fan of pumpkin, specifically pumpkin pies, pumpkin cookies, pumpkin muffins, and the like. In the 1990s, I baked two or three pumpkin pies for some fundraising events at the cajoling of my late friend Darby. But my favorite pies to eat tend to be apple pie or maybe a blueberry pie.

General Mills

Since I don’t drink coffee, I don’t drink a pumpkin spice latte. I don’t eat Pumpkin Spice Cheerios, available only for a limited time; I don’t need dessert for breakfast. I like regular Cheerios, and I have eaten Honey Nut Cheerios for breakfast, which negates my point about dessert for breakfast.

What I really like, though, is when you Ask Roger Anything. You may ask Roger about his taste in pies, cakes, music, movies, or politics; it doesn’t matter as long as it doesn’t involve pumpkin spice.

I would love you to ask in the next few days, and I will be sure to reply in the next three or four weeks. As always, I promise to be as honest as I can be. It’s fun to hear what you want me to talk about. When you come up with very clever questions, a change of perspective is always helpful.

As usual, you may leave your questions in the blog’s comments section or my Facebook page (Roger Owen Green); look for the duck.

Ask Roger Anything, especially this

blogging on a pizza

Yeah, I’m asking you to Ask Roger Anything because I do. But I’m seeking, especially this particular wrinkle. I would like you to list the names of bands or solo musicians, as many as you like. And I must name the ONE or maybe two or three favorite songs from the artist or group, and why.

I hope that your choices include folks from whom I know more than one song. Don’t ask me about Dexys Midnight Runners because I don’t know any other tunes, though I have heard some in the past.

It’s interesting to me that music, most of which I have heard before, is now more likely to make me emotional. Sometimes, it’s sadness but more often, it’s joy. One example is the end section of Surf’s Up by the Beach Boys, originally scheduled for the Smile album, but which appeared at the end of the Surf’s Up album.

Books

I linked to a meme on Facebook. “Umberto Eco, who owned 50,000 books, had this to say about home libraries: ‘It is foolish to think that you have to read all the books you buy, as it is foolish to criticize those who buy more books than they will ever be able to read. It would be like saying that you should use all the cutlery or glasses or screwdrivers or drill bits you bought before buying new ones…

“‘If, for example, we consider books as medicine, we understand that it is good to have many at home rather than a few: when you want to feel better, then you go to the ‘medicine closet’ and choose a book. Not a random one, but the right book for that moment. That’s why you should always have a nutrition choice!'”

So you could make me cut my 2,000 or 3,000 books – I didn’t count them – down to (ouch!) 100. What would I keep? You could ask that.

Or whatever

There was an item on Quora recently. “Can you answer this question: ‘Can you explain the process of blogging on a pizza?'” I was tempted to respond that I tend to blog on media slightly more permanent than a pizza, but I didn’t know how helpful that would be.

But you can ask anything else as well. I will answer, more or less truthfully, in the next month. Please make your requests in the comments section of this post, email me at rogerogreen (AT) Gmail (DOT) com, or contact me on Facebook. Heck, I’m still on Twitter as ersie, more out of inertia. (This is why I don’t call it whatever.) Always look for the duck.