The other day I went on a 21 mile bike ride (I may, or may not, be training to ride the Seattle to Portland Bike Ride -- 100+ miles two days in a row) During the ride I passed through a neighborhood I seldom go to and rode by the once-upon-a-time house of Old Weird Ben (OWB). Ben was my age or perhaps a year or two younger, but "old weird" was a perfect nickname for him.
He was a friend of sorts, although much of my interest was similar to watching a top as it's spin slows and it starts to wobble. The fascination of wondering when, exactly, it will topple over, jerk around and fall off the table. During one of our regular sessions of speed chess -- we'd play several games until Ben got too frustrated, then I'd let him win one, he'd gloat, and we would stop. -- But during that session he told me of a time when he was pulled over by the police in Idaho and he happened to be carrying fifteen tabs of acid (he wasn't a dealer -- they were for his own use). The 60's was a very bad time to be arrested for drug possession in Idaho, so he swallowed all fifteen tabs. "I've never been quite the same since." he said. I imagine that sticking your tongue in a light socket to perform do-it-yourself electro-shock therapy would produce a similar effect.
I'm not a very good chess player, and my string of wins came, I imagine, because he couldn't always tell the difference between a pawn and a bishop or the king and queen. He hadn't let the Idaho incident change anything -- he was still a regular, enthusiastic user* and my interest in him was kind of morbid.
Nearly every time I visited he would come up with something new. Once he told me he made a canoe by folding a sheet of corrugated aluminum, wiring the ends together, smearing on some tar and putting in a spacer. The paddle was a board nailed to a broom handle. He got the mess to the middle of the river before it collapsed and sank. OWB couldn't swim but he had carried a cooler for the beer and he was able to hold on and make his way to shore (he sadly shook his head: "I lost all the beer." -- he wasn't joking)
(I have to give Ben his due: In the time I knew him, he wasn't a layabout. He always had a job. How he managed to get and keep a job was another of the mysteries surrounding him -- along with why he was still alive)
OWB's piece de resistance also involved the river and a boat. He decided he needed to sail around the world, so he bought a derelict life boat and a derelict Airstream Trailer. He put the one on the other -- cut down an alder tree, trimmed and peeled it for a mast, bolted them together and -- Presto -- an inexpensive ocean-going yacht. While he was cleaning and putting the finishing touches on his boat (I don't remember if he had named it) he had moved from his house and was living on the boat.
(Another unexpected attribute: he was always neat and clean)
On the particular day that marked the end of our acquaintance he was trying to sleep in. (I heard about this from a neighboring "yachtsman") But OWB's sleep was disturbed by an on-going river dredging operation, so he borrowed a row-boat, rowed out to the dredge, clambered on board and politely asked them to stop dredging. The dredge crew picked him up and threw him in the river.
OWB returned to his yacht, collected a few sticks of dynamite he had laying around, rowed back to the dredge, and started lighting and throwing the dynamite at the dredge -- I don't believe Ben intended to injure anyone, he just wanted some quiet time. -- something we can all sympathize with.
In short order, the river patrol reeled him in and he got an extended period of quiet time. He was eventually released but the dynamite thing was a little too amusing and I never contacted him again.
*I didn't share his drug affections. My drugs of choice were -- and are -- in order: (1) Caffeine -- although I no longer measure my consumption in quarts per day -- (2) Nicotine -- I quit 10+ years ago but would happily start again -- and (3) alcohol -- infrequent nowadays. DA
Books: Parisians (Graham Robb) "A creative montage of how history, individuals, and geography intersected at key moments in Paris" -- a fair description. Also a "stylish and stylized tale" -- a bit too stylish and stylized writing-wise for my taste but I did finish it. And The Nothing That Is -- a natural history of zero (Robert Kaplan) The title and sub-title pretty well describe the book. Of interest: Unlike many math historians, Robb maintains that the concept and symbol of zero came from Greece rather than India. I fear that my skill at Sanskrit and Attic Greek (let along linear B) is too limited to weigh in on the subject. DA
He was a friend of sorts, although much of my interest was similar to watching a top as it's spin slows and it starts to wobble. The fascination of wondering when, exactly, it will topple over, jerk around and fall off the table. During one of our regular sessions of speed chess -- we'd play several games until Ben got too frustrated, then I'd let him win one, he'd gloat, and we would stop. -- But during that session he told me of a time when he was pulled over by the police in Idaho and he happened to be carrying fifteen tabs of acid (he wasn't a dealer -- they were for his own use). The 60's was a very bad time to be arrested for drug possession in Idaho, so he swallowed all fifteen tabs. "I've never been quite the same since." he said. I imagine that sticking your tongue in a light socket to perform do-it-yourself electro-shock therapy would produce a similar effect.
I'm not a very good chess player, and my string of wins came, I imagine, because he couldn't always tell the difference between a pawn and a bishop or the king and queen. He hadn't let the Idaho incident change anything -- he was still a regular, enthusiastic user* and my interest in him was kind of morbid.
Nearly every time I visited he would come up with something new. Once he told me he made a canoe by folding a sheet of corrugated aluminum, wiring the ends together, smearing on some tar and putting in a spacer. The paddle was a board nailed to a broom handle. He got the mess to the middle of the river before it collapsed and sank. OWB couldn't swim but he had carried a cooler for the beer and he was able to hold on and make his way to shore (he sadly shook his head: "I lost all the beer." -- he wasn't joking)
(I have to give Ben his due: In the time I knew him, he wasn't a layabout. He always had a job. How he managed to get and keep a job was another of the mysteries surrounding him -- along with why he was still alive)
(Another unexpected attribute: he was always neat and clean)
On the particular day that marked the end of our acquaintance he was trying to sleep in. (I heard about this from a neighboring "yachtsman") But OWB's sleep was disturbed by an on-going river dredging operation, so he borrowed a row-boat, rowed out to the dredge, clambered on board and politely asked them to stop dredging. The dredge crew picked him up and threw him in the river.
OWB returned to his yacht, collected a few sticks of dynamite he had laying around, rowed back to the dredge, and started lighting and throwing the dynamite at the dredge -- I don't believe Ben intended to injure anyone, he just wanted some quiet time. -- something we can all sympathize with.
In short order, the river patrol reeled him in and he got an extended period of quiet time. He was eventually released but the dynamite thing was a little too amusing and I never contacted him again.
*I didn't share his drug affections. My drugs of choice were -- and are -- in order: (1) Caffeine -- although I no longer measure my consumption in quarts per day -- (2) Nicotine -- I quit 10+ years ago but would happily start again -- and (3) alcohol -- infrequent nowadays. DA
Books: Parisians (Graham Robb) "A creative montage of how history, individuals, and geography intersected at key moments in Paris" -- a fair description. Also a "stylish and stylized tale" -- a bit too stylish and stylized writing-wise for my taste but I did finish it. And The Nothing That Is -- a natural history of zero (Robert Kaplan) The title and sub-title pretty well describe the book. Of interest: Unlike many math historians, Robb maintains that the concept and symbol of zero came from Greece rather than India. I fear that my skill at Sanskrit and Attic Greek (let along linear B) is too limited to weigh in on the subject. DA
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