Freedom Friday

Gymnastics

Posted on January 18, 2013January 18, 2013 by Jack Flacco

I love the sport of gymnastics. It’s one of the most difficult sports to master. And as such, since this is my Freedom Friday post, I thought I’d write about my favorite sport.

Growing up, I had such an intense crush on 14-year-old Nadia Comaneci. For those who don’t know her, as a Romanian gymnast she won three gold medals in the 1976 Montreal Olympic Games, and two golds in the 1980 Moscow Olympic Games.

Let me tell you something about those wins in Montreal.

She had just finished her routine on the uneven bars and the crowd waited for her score. The judges didn’t know how to rate her performance, so the board lit up with the number 1.00. Back then, the judges could score a routine between 0.00 and 10.00. The crowd’s natural reaction was shock. A flawless performance and she only gets a 1.00? That is, until a great outburst of applause rushed through the venue. The judges did not score her a 1.00 but a perfect 10.00!

Omega SA, the official scoreboard manufacturer for the Games, had only supplied scoreboards capable of displaying 9.99 and nothing more because they’d understood no one could achieve a perfect score.

Nadia went on to score six additional perfect tens at those Games. I remember seeing her perform and she captured my heart. How could such a diminutive girl twirl so much, jump so far and fly so high?

I followed her career throughout the late Seventies, early Eighties. Between 1975-1981, she went on to win twenty-one gold, seven silver and two bronze medals in two Olympic Games, two World Championships, three European Championships, and the 1981 Summer University Games.

What an incredible feat for a girl at such a young age!

Once she retired, I found my love for the sport had not diminished. I followed all the up-and-coming gymnasts—this time as a true fan of the sport. I tuned into all the meets, got to know which countries had the strongest gymnasts and followed them. I familiarized myself with all the terms: Hand guard, apparatus, deduction, high bar, mat, junior, senior, element group requirements, chalk, balance, all-around, elite, clubs, somersault, roll, straddle, vault, kip, pike, layout, front tuck, dismount, cartwheel, etc. All of it.

I’ll never forget watching Mary Lou Retton score her perfect tens in the 1984 Los Angeles Olympic Games. That night, my parents had gone out leaving me home alone to watch TV. All I could do was sit at the edge of my seat. Retton had to beat Romania’s Ecaterina Szabo, who led the all-around by fifteen-hundredths of a point. With two events to go, she hit the mat. She twirled, somersaulted, smiled and danced her way into the hearts of Americans. The judges were sure: A perfect ten. Next, came the vault. She nailed it, grabbing another perfect ten. Retton won against her rival by 0.05 points.

Another incredible feat for a girl at such a young age!

Mary Lou Retton, 1984 Olympic All-Around Champion

As the years pass, gymnasts come and go. I make it a point to watch the Olympics every time. Although my first love may have faded some for the sport, I’ve kept the tradition alive. Not an Olympics has passed that I do not know who the gymnasts are. And every four years there’s a surprise. A twisted ankle. A daunting fall. And every four years there’s a gymnast who overcomes every obstacle to become a new hero to the ordinary folk.

I love gymnastics. It’s my favorite sport.

Have you seen gymnasts rise to the occasion and win a gold at the Olympics? Are there heroes in gymnastics you admire for their sheer willpower of never giving in to defeat?

My Sushi Recipe

Posted on January 11, 2013May 8, 2017 by Jack Flacco

I’m back with another Freedom Friday post. If you’re joining me for the first time, I tend to use Fridays as the day I can let loose, chat about nothing really and still try to make sense of the whole thing. Get it? Yeah, me neither. You can read all my Freedom Friday posts simply by clicking on the link on the Features panel.

My salmon & avocado dish at The Sushi Garden

Okay, I feel like food. Well, I feel like talking about food. Strange, coming from a guy whose main preoccupation is zombies, aliens, and female superheroes. The caveat to writing all my blog posts is I get hungry occasionally and need to eat. What does a mind focused on the undead eat? Ah, good question. I thought I’d share a recipe with you.

No, it’s not man brains served on a platter. What am I, Hannibal Lecter? Besides, that’s kind of gross.

My Salmon's Lover's Sushi dish at The Sushi Garden — My Salmon’s Lover’s Sushi dish at The Sushi Garden

For anyone who knows me, I have an affinity for sushi. If you haven’t tried sushi, get into a sushi bar pronto and live a little! It’s an experience you will soon never forget. And just because it’s called a sushi bar doesn’t mean they serve alcohol. It means, it’s an all-you-can-eat restaurant of sorts, with plenty of time for chitchat. Whenever I go there with the family, it’s no less than three hours of absolute delight. Lots of food, and lots of chatter.

Anyway, getting back to my sushi recipe. I’ll first give you the ingredients then I’ll provide the directions—hows and whys, and all that stuff.

Ingredients:

Nori (raw seaweed)

Sticky rice (uh-hu, it’s really called sticky rice)

1-2 Avocado (this will serve four)

1 Lemon

Smoked salmon (sliced, preferably in sealed package)

Directions:

Cook the rice as directed on the package. The typical cooking time is twenty minutes with a standing time of five minutes. Cook as much as you need. If you’re cooking for four then one avocado will do. I tend to cook for eight because…well, my family likes sushi.

As the rice cooks, take the time for prep. You’ll need a Bamboo sushi mat. So make sure it’s clean. I wrap my mat with plastic wrap (hey, that rhymes). You’re going to need the sushi mat to roll your maki. Maki is the name for a particular type of sushi. You can learn the various other kinds of sushi names by reading the menu from a sushi bar first. This is how I learned how to make my sushi. Silly, I know. But it worked for me.

Once you’ve cooked your rice, you can start the rolling process. First, take a sheet of nori, lay it on the sushi mat, and spread the rice evenly on the sheet. What you want is a nice bed for the filling.

Next, lay the smoked salmon slices on the rice. This is so good. No cheating. Don’t eat any of the slices while you’re making it—it’ll spoil your supper.

When you’re done, scoop some avocado and spread it on the salmon. Make sure it’s even. What you don’t want is to get a piece without the filling. Believe me, a piece with only nori and rice is good, but a piece with the filling included is better.

After you filled the entire sheet, you roll the sheet into a roll (there’s a tongue twister).

The last part is cutting the roll into pieces, laying them on the presentation plate. Spray a little lemon, so as the avocado doesn’t get brown, and serve.

And there it is. My salmon sushi I make from scratch, right at home. Food fit for a zombie slayer!

To see how it’s done, check out this video on YouTube.

By the way, with every sushi meal you need some wasabi, Japanese pickled ginger and soy sauce. I should have mentioned that earlier. This is how it’s done: Take a small plate, pour some soy sauce, add some wasabi, stir and dip the sushi in the mixture. While enjoying the bite, slip in some ginger.

Heaven.

Have you ever made sushi? What do you like about it? Do you like eating it at a sushi bar or at a dedicated restaurant? If so, why? I’d love to hear your comments!

Freedom Friday

Today’s Technology

Posted on January 4, 2013December 30, 2012 by Jack Flacco

Here we are again, Freedom Friday. If you’re joining this series for the first time, you can search for all the posts by simply clicking on the Freedom Friday link above this post. For those who need a refresher, I use Freedom Friday to express my views about what’s current, what’s not or anything else that may trickle into this brain of mine at the time of writing.

At this moment, I’m thinking technology. In particular, I’m thinking about how far technology has come from the good ol’ days when a large 27-inch TV and a VCR dominated our entertainment centers. Anyone remember this? For some of us, we had two VCRs—one for recording and one to watch recordings. It made for a simplistic life, but much of what the 80’s had, delved on simplistic.

We cherished those cold, winter evenings when we got back home from work, prepared a warm soup for dinner and plopped on the couch to watch the latest episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation.

Let’s not forget those autumn Tuesday night comedies. How can I forget taping episodes of Home Improvement so I can watch them later. Those episodes always shattered my funny bone for some reason.

So much has changed.

Today, we live as a traveling society. We bring our entertainment with us. We can download any episode of any series we’d like; plop it on our iPods, iPhones, Nexus 7’s, Samsung Galaxy Tab’s, whatever—and we can watch them on the go. Gone are the days where we sit in front of the TV as past generations. The media we consume, at the rate we consume it, is unbelievable to those who’d lived in the VCR age.

Take, for instance, music. I remember a time when I’d recorded my favorite tracks on a cassette tape in a specific order based on how the songs meshed. Then, when I traveled with my Sony Walkman, I could listen to them on the go.

Boy, that no longer happens. At least, I don’t think.

Today, I can carry my entire music library I had carefully culled over the period of decades on my iPod. I have mixtape playlists, compilation playlists and even live playlists (those used when rating songs during my travels).

Insane!

This is what our technology has brought us. We can carry our whole media library anywhere we go and consume it at a bus station, truck stop, library, museum, deli, newsstand, restaurant, friend’s house, wilderness, bus, train, woods, park, walking, hiking, boating, sailing, running, riding, traveling, etc. all in the confines of our realities.

I laugh. How did we do it back in the 80’s?

Anyone else notice how far technology has advanced? Anyone else have the same idea I have with the way we consume our media? What about books? Do you like hardcover books or do you read them on a Kindle or another reader?

Freedom Friday

Snow

Posted on December 28, 2012December 28, 2012 by Jack Flacco

In keeping with the Freedom Friday theme I began last week, where I get to tell you more about what goes through this little head of mine. I want to talk about snow. You heard me the first time. Snow. Although, not the snow you’re thinking of. I’m referring to the snow we may have seen on analog TVs when the cable’s gone out. Some of us may remember blank VHS tapes also featuring this wonderful spectacle of black and white dots.

If you haven’t seen it, then I’m not sure what picture I’ve attached to this post.

Common atmospheric sources for this electromagnetic noise are radio waves from local electronic devices or cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB or CMBR for short). That last point I can only describe as a residual image from an early stage of the universe’s development.

Yeah, the definition freaked me out, too. Anyway, I wondered about this static the other day.

For instance, a couple of prominent movies come to mind featuring snow. The first one is Poltergeist. This is the movie where the little girl watches TV, and all that’s playing is snow. I had to look for it on YouTube to remember how the scene went. A few things happen in regards to her late night viewing of her interesting choice of programming. The girl then turns around and says, the now famous line, “They’re heeere.”

I’m not going to spoil who “they” are.

The other movie is The Ring. If you haven’t seen it, skip this paragraph. It’s about a group of teenagers who find a VHS tape in a cabin in the middle of the woods. They play the tape, which first begins with snow, then after watching it they find in seven days they’re going to die. If you have a soft stomach for this kind of horror flick, I wouldn’t recommend it. But if you love edge-of-your-seat suspense like The Sixth Sense, this movie’s for you.

So, back to what ran through my mind. What if scientists could scoop all this electromagnetic noise, put it back together and recreate a model of the instant the world came to being. Wouldn’t that be something? Of course, not a physical model. A virtual model.

A step further would entail scientists taking that methodology, piecing together the past, and move it to piece together simple molecular structures.

You guys are quick. You know where I’m going with this.

What would stop science from creating a transportation device akin to the transporter featured in Star Trek? It wouldn’t be too far off. I mean, we already have the Kindle/Nexus/Galaxy tablets and cell phones, ideas that originated from the show. Who’s to say the transporter is not next?

Huh, all because of snow.

What do you think? Are we close to Star Trek’s transporter making an appearance this century? Or will we have to wait? I’m interested in what you have to say.

Freedom Friday

Posted on December 21, 2012December 21, 2012 by Jack Flacco

End of days? Will the world keep spinning after the Maya Calendar ends? Most likely!

Here we are, Freedom Friday. I’ve set aside Fridays as the day when I can let loose and be free. That’s right. Sort of like a merry-go-round without the weird and wonderful music. I get to tell you about the stuff I’ve gleaned this week from my charming world of observation.

This week? Well, if you’ve read my Monday Mayhem post I wrote, you’re already in the know. You did read it, right? If not, go ahead and read it. I’ll wait…

Oh, you’re done? Okay. So here’s the deal—today’s December 21, 2012. Yup. And you know what that means. It’s D-Day according to the Mayan Calendar. Ah-ha! I got your attention! I thought you had read it?

As I was saying, today is the End of the World. I have the date marked in my Outlook, so it must be true. It’s the day when the Mayan calendar ends. Uh-huh. Ceases to exist. Dies. Kaput. Splat.

National Aeronautics and Space Administration

Now, under any other circumstance, a day such as today means—well, absolutely nothing. But not today. Did you know NASA’s gotten involved with unraveling this whole dilemma? They have a site dedicated to answering common questions of why the world won’t end on December 21, 2012—TODAY.

Imagine that. NASA. This’s got to be big if NASA’s involved!

When browsing their site, I’ve encountered questions such as:

Are there any threats to the Earth in 2012? Many Internet websites say the world will end in December 2012.

What is the origin of the prediction that the world will end in 2012?

Is NASA predicting a “total blackout” of Earth on Dec. 23 to Dec. 25?

Could planets align in a way that impacts Earth?

Is there a planet or brown dwarf called Nibiru or Planet X or Eris that is approaching the Earth and threatening our planet with widespread destruction?

What is the polar shift theory? Is it true that the Earth’s crust does a 180-degree rotation around the core in a matter of days if not hours?

Is the Earth in danger of being hit by a meteor in 2012?

A Leonid meteor, or a shooting star seen in the 2009 Leonid Meteor Shower.

Fascinating stuff. I wouldn’t have thought this being an issue. After all, we live in an enlightened age. An age where we can carry our whole media library in the palm of our hands (ie. iPods, iPads, Nexus 7 & 10’s, Samsung Galaxy Tab 2 7.0 & 10.1’s, etc.). Who would think a meteor could scream to earth and wipe us from existence? Not me. Not a chance.

Thomas Nast's most famous drawing, "Merry Old Santa Claus", from the January 1, 1881 edition of Harper's Weekly. — Thomas Nast’s most famous drawing, “Merry Old Santa Claus”, from the January 1, 1881 edition of Harper’s Weekly.

But, I have to admit, it is a rather entertaining read when compared to the whole Santa Clause is not real controversy. Oops, did I say that out loud? Forget I said that. No one’s the wiser. Just in case though, if I don’t show up on Monday then you’ll know a massive chunk of the universe leveled my home…and anything within a few thousand miles radius.

Did you know what today is? Do you have any plans to celebrate the End of the World? What are your thoughts about NASA’s involvement with the Mayan end-of-days? I’d really love to know.

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