I’ve mentioned before that I play the Powerball lottery. I usually buy my ticket at the same store, just a mile or so down the street from my home. When our state first got the lottery, the whole thing was just the one game. Then came various scratch off cards. Steadily the options for scratch off cards increased, and now there are about two dozen ways to play. A sizable space on the store counter is given to the case for all the scratch off cards.

I don’t play the scratch offs. I picked up a couple different ones way back, but after seeing how they work, I have no interest in them. The scratch off cards are not really any kind of game, and you don’t really play them. The scratch off cards I’ve seen have no real game to them – no thought or choice is necessary, at all. You simply scratch off all parts of the card and see if a win is under any of them. So basically, a scratch off card is either a winner or a loser before you pick it up and scratch it. That’s not a game.

To play the Powerball lottery, you at least get to pick what numbers you want to bet on. You can use special numbers, like birthdays or anniversaries, or you can just choose random numbers. I’ve tried different methods for choosing numbers, but lately I just go random. I mark whatever numbers come to mind when I’m filling out the card.

Now, I’ll admit this way of playing a game does not require a great mind, or even any understanding of the game at all. But I’m willingly self-deluded enough (or elitist enough) to think choosing my own numbers is a more real way to play a game than just scratching silver gunk off a card that was determined a winner or looser at the printer.

If you’ve never bought a lottery ticket before, this is how it’s done—I’m only explaining this to tell the next story:
You fill out a card and then hand it to the store clerk. The clerk runs the card through a machine that scans it and prints out the actual lottery ticket. The fill-out card is useless after you have the ticket, but some people, myself included, keep the filled out card with the ticket. I fold the card around the ticket to protect it—the ticket is pretty fragile and easily damaged by moisture.

When I bought my latest lottery ticket, there was another man in the store cashing in his ticket for $3. I was back sitting in my car in front of the store when that man exited the store. He threw his old lottery card in the trash (having turned in the ticket). But he didn’t just toss it in the can, or crumple it up and toss it in, as I would have done. He stood there and tore it up into small pieces and sprinkled them around the garbage. What was that about? Was he concerned that someone would come through the trash and find the numbers he bet on? If that was his concern, how did he pick his numbers? Did he have a pattern that he thought would work, and would be worth someone going through the trash for them? Did he use some personal information for the numbers? It just struck me as odd, and maybe paranoid.

So, after he left the store, I went to the trash and rummaged through it for the card pieces . . . okay, no I didn’t. I drove away before he even got in his car. But this post was starting to seem really weak and aimless, so I thought maybe it needed something to make it interesting. But I got nothing.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

I had to get an MRI today. [Nothing serious.] I thought I had gotten an MRI scan before, but it turns out what I remembered was just a CT scan (for something completely unrelated). An MRI is a much longer procedure.

The first interesting thing about this procedure is that the MRI is not in the office building where I signed in and waited, but rather, in a big truck trailer outside. You have to ride a lift up about five feet to get to the door. Inside the trailer looks like a very small office, and is cold.

The nurse/tech had asked me all kinds of questions before taking me into the trailer, including if I had had any surgery on my heart, brain, or eyes, if I was allergic to anything, and whether I had any metal in my eyes. Huh? Metal in my eyes? She was going through the checklist, so I didn’t get to ask what kind of metal someone might have in their eyes.

I had to leave all of my stuff (cell phone, wallet, etc.) in a basket, of course, but I didn’t have to change clothes. The MRI machine, itself, looks like a Star Trek photon torpedo tube. (Only a small number of people reading this will get a good idea of what it looks like from that description, but it’s the first thing that came to mind when I saw it.) I laid down on a sliding rail, with a cushion under my knees.

Lying on the rail, the nurse/tech asked me if I was claustrophobic. She gave me a squeeze bulb, like they use to check your blood pressure, to squeeze if I had a problem and needed to come out of the MRI machine. She gave me a pair of earplugs and I inserted them. The earplugs kind of confused me – this machine wasn’t making any sound at the moment, and it looked like a normal, but big, piece of doctor’s office equipment, so I didn’t expect it would be noisy.

The rail table slowly rolled back into the MRI machine, my head going in first, and I was surprised at how really tight the tunnel was. I fit in it just fine, but I can’t imagine how they’d get a large person in there. I mean, the top was about three inches from my nose, and my elbows were probably just two inches from the sides. I don’t think I could have moved my arms from across my chest to above my head.

There was a little speaker in the top of the tube, right in front of my face, and that’s how the nurse/tech communicated with me. “Okay, I’m starting it. This will take about forty-five seconds.” The speaker was loud in my face, so maybe that’s why I needed the earplugs. Then there were several loud thumps under me and the machine started humming. So that’s what the earplugs were for. I was surprised at how noisy it all was. The machine looks so space-age that I expected just a light hum or beep.

When the scan was over, the nurse/tech said through the speaker, “This next one will last about thirty seconds.” Then again with the rapid thumps and vibrating humming.

The scanning was easy, and the volume was not disconcerting, but it was just very different than I expected. When that scan was finished, the nurse/tech said, “That’s it for those. Now this next scan will take about four minutes.”

What? When I had a CT scan, the whole thing was over in about sixty seconds. Oh well, I could wait in there another four minutes. The only thing starting to concern me was that my legs were not completely comfortable. When I had laid down, with the cushion under my knees, I sort of held my legs up a bit instead of fully resting them down no the pillow. Not a problem to hold up for a couple minutes, but they were already starting to get uncomfortable.

The machine loudly thumped, clicked, hummed, and thrummed for a few minutes. I shifted my head just slightly, enough to turn my eyes to see a bit more up and down the tube. I couldn’t see down because my arms across my chest blocked that view, but I could see a little up above my head. My head was near the far end of the tube, so I could see a small area at the back of the trailer, behind the machine. I could see a ventilation shaft, what looked like plumbing tubes, and a drape of shear fabric.

The few minutes passed and the machine’s racket quieted down. The nurse/tech announced that the next step was going to take three minutes. Geez, how long does this take? I thought. Mentally, I was doing fine, but holding my legs up without being able to move them for fear of screwing up the scan was now fully uncomfortable.

The thumping, clicking, humming, and thrumming this time seemed to be taking on a tempo. It sounded like some kind of experimental, industrial, heavy metal music.

Thump, thump. Clickclickclickclickclick. Thump. Hummmmm, thrummmm, hummmm. Thump. I imagined the humming saying, “daaa lot, daaa lot,” and eventually turning into, “taa daa, taa daa.”

The sounds and vibrations eventually died down, and the expected announcement blared in my face, “Good, good. This next one will take about five minutes.” The thumps and clicks started before I managed to say, “Can I shift my legs a moment?” The sounds stopped and I assumed that meant the nurse/tech heard me and stopped the machine, so I shifted my legs what little I could in the tube. Once I settled again, the machine started up back up.

My legs were more comfortable now, and I began to accept I might be in this contraption for a long while. I thought I could doze a little, despite the loud mechanical sounds. The five minutes seemed very long. It just kept going and going. I heard the music of the sounds again, and I was just starting to close my eyes when the machine powered down.

I looked at the speaker, expecting to hear how many minutes the procedure would continue, but after a few seconds, the rail bed started pulling me back out feet first. Once out of the torpedo tube, and retrieving my stuff from the basket, I saw the computer screen with some MRI images. I was impressed—I could plainly see my internal organs and bones.

The nurse/tech explained she couldn’t talk to me about the images because that is the doctor’s place. She took me out of the trailer and we rode down the lift. That was it, I was all done. It was not a bad experience, by any means, but I really wish I had known how long I’d be in the tube so I could have gotten comfortable and maybe napped. All in all, a pretty interesting experience for something completely stationary.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

My wife just bought a new hairdryer. It’s about time; the cord on her old dryer is twisted up like a phone cord. The marketing blurbs on the box for this dryer are cracking me up.

These terms and phrases are exactly as they appear on the box:

“Elegant Amethyst Finish” – It’s a shiny purple color.

“super quietTM“ – They trademarked this?

“fast dryTM“ – They trademarked this?

“Lightweight” – Why did they capitalize the first letter of this, but not “super quiet” and “fast dry” — this doesn’t start a sentence, it’s just a term on the box. Why is this one word. Why did they not trademark this? I mean, if “super quiet” and “fast dry” can be trademarked, why not “Lightweight”? It even has a unique spelling to differentiate it from “light weight”.

“Helps dry hair fast while retaining moisture and reducing ‘frizz’” – Doesn’t retaining moisture mean your hair is not dry?

I’ve written marketing copy in my career, but I really hope I’ve never written anything as silly as this.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com

Yeah, I know, I’m late to the Deadwood party. I had heard about this HBO series back when it was airing, but since I didn’t have HBO, I just put it out of my mind. But it’s been out on DVD for a while now, so it’s about time I actually check it out.

Many years ago, I did a great deal of study on the American “Wild West”—I was a big fan of the time, the territory, and the people. I even wrote a role playing game based on it all. Because of my knowledge of the real Old West, I’m often disappointed by many Western genre movies and TV shows, especially if they are based on real people or events. (I have the same situation with World War II genre movies and TV shows.)

Deadwood, Dakota Territory (now South Dakota) was a real gold rush boom town of the 1870s, and I’ve read some about it and its notable “citizens,” including Wild Bill Hickok. So I approached this series somewhat apprehensively. I’d either love it or hate it. Hollywood’s track record for showing real historical characters did not make me excited for the prospect of loving it.

But I was surprised. I love this show. I remember just enough about the time, place, people, and circumstances Deadwood presents that I get a little giddy when I recognize a name or event. Now, I have no illusions that this series is anything like an accurate historical documentary. I understand the details are probably 90% fiction. But still, there’re just enough nods to the real history and people to make someone like me excited. Even the characters I don’t recognize fit in so well that I want to look up the old books and see if I can find reference to them.

So far, I’ve only watched the first two episodes, one hour each, of the first season. (Each DVD has just two episodes.) A plot item that has me really interested is one that has only vaguely been hinted at so far—and the vague hints are probably only noticeable to someone with knowledge of the character and the town.

Wild Bill Hickok is one of my favorite characters of the Old West; he was a legend in his own time, head and shoulders above the other legends of the Old West, and he understood it. His presence in Deadwood, and the presence of the man named Jack [McCall] at his poker table has built a suspense that has me watching every nuance of their interchange. If this show is following the true history of Hickok in Deadwood, I know exactly what will happen and how it will happen. I’m just on pins and needles waiting, sadly, for it to happen. I actually don’t want it to happen, as if it not happening in this TV series will change anything about the real history. But then again, if it does not happen, I think the show will loose my interest, because it will be departing from the little historical ties that have bound my interest to the show.

In movies, a bomb exploding at the table is surprise, but showing the bomb under the table several times before it explodes is suspense. This Deadwood plot item can be both surprise and suspense, depending on the viewer’s knowledge of the characters and time. Those who don’t know the characters’ histories will be surprised; those who do know the characters’ histories watch this in suspense. That’s an interesting position for a filmmaker. The writers and directors of Deadwood seem to be trying for suspense by showing little hints of the plot, but I wonder if anyone other than those in the historical know actually pick up on those hints. I mean, the real historical outcome of this plot point defies the standard Hollywood style.

Bullgrit
bullgrit@totalbullgrit.com