Why college football fans stay home

College football remains a popular game on television, but in-person attendance at games is dropping. Some of the sport's leaders have expressed surprise at this, but if you've been to a college football games in recent years, you'll know why so many seats are empty: Fans at college football games are not treated very well.

College football fans pay a lot to attend a game, then are screened like criminals at the entrance gates and are treated as a mere afterthought in a TV-centered event. 

Even I,  a college football fan who has attended hundreds of games across the country over the years, am questioning whether to keep going.

Empty stands at this year's game between San Diego 
State and Towson State

Here are the problems:

The Price of Admission: Earlier this year I spent $61 per seat for three tickets to the UCLA-Arizona game in Tucson. No, wait a minute, there was a mysterious extra $2 "fee" on each ticket, so it was $63. No, wait a minute, there was another $1 per ticket "delivery cost" (even though these were electronic tickets). So a total of $192 for three seats on a metal bench in the upper deck with no back or arm rests. If we wanted to sit closer to the field, the price would have been over $140 per seat.

And this wasn't even a big game: Coming in, Arizona was on a 16-game losing streak.

By comparison, a $12 ticket to the local movie theater gives you a wide reclining seat with a footrest.

It's common to pay over $100 per seat for many college football games. But that's not all. A friend of mine said he had to make a $5,000 donation to San Diego State just for privilege of buying season football tickets.

And don't forget the $10 to $40 you'll spend for parking.

Or, you could stay at home and watch the game on TV for no more than the monthly price of your satellite or cable fee, which gives you access to scores of games.

When does the game start? If you bought tickets to see "Hamilton" even six months from now, you would know whether it was an 8 p.m. show or a 2 p.m. matinee and that would not change. But college football fans are kept in the dark, with the kickoff time not announced until a week or two ahead of time. It could be an afternoon game, it could be a night game, it could even start at 9 a.m. (as the Boise State-San Diego State game did this year). 

Sure, you might need to plan your life, but TV dictates when the game starts and they'll tell you when they're good and ready.

Entering the stadium: You'd think that fans paying the high ticket prices of college football would be warmly welcomed at the gate, but instead they're greeted by grim security personnel doing intrusive searches, X-ray scanners and a long list of items they can't bring in. Depending on the stadium, you might be barred from bringing in food, fanny packs, even diaper bags.

Commercial timeouts: This is probably the biggest complaint among in-person college football fans. Imagine if you went to "Hamilton" and every seven or eight minutes, the show just stopped, all the performers milled about on the stage for three minutes, and then they show restarted. And this happened about 20 times during the show. Would you continue to go to the theater if every show was like this?

This is pretty much what football fans have to deal with because of the pervasive TV commercial breaks throughout the game. Everything stops and nothing happens — over and over and over. These stoppages can easily add an hour to each game. 

Sure, if you're watching at home on TV, you have to deal with the commercial breaks, too. But you can surf channels, do other things around the house, or simply record the game so you can skip through all the breaks.

Hungry? As I mentioned, some venues make it difficult to bring your own sandwich and chips to the game. Before considering going to the concession stand, you might want to consider taking out a loan. As just an example. a regular bottle of water at San Diego State games in 2021 cost $7, while a personal pizza was $10 and a beer $14.

I've also noticed that some stadiums are going "cashless" for all purchases. Personally, this doesn't bother me much, but for some people it might. It's another example of how the venue is doing what's convenient for it, not for the fans.

Replays:  Watching on TV, you get multiple replays of key moments, plus an endless parade of key stats. But at stadiums, they seem to offer this kind of thing grudgingly: A handful of replays here, a smattering of basic stats there. On TV, they'll note if the quarterback has completed 12 passes in a row, or if one team has failed to convert on five straight third downs, but this kind of proactive, fan-friendly information is rare in the stadium

Can you understand the public address announcer?  Usually you can't. Is it that hard to have a good P.A. system? 

Book review: "So Happiness to Meet You" by Karin Esterhammer

Many an American, perhaps unhappy with life in the U.S., or just bored, has pondered what it would be like to leave the country and start anew elsewhere.  Would it be exciting? Liberating? Strange? 

For most Americans this is just a passing daydream, but Karin Esterhammer actually did it. In 2008, she and her husband Robin, plus their 8-year-old son, abruptly left their Los Angeles home and moved to Vietnam.

In her enjoyable book "So Happiness to Meet You," Esterhammer describes the difficulties, surprises and comical moments that followed.   

Esterhammer had just been laid off from her job and her husband's small business was sputtering, so they decided that a year in low-cost Vietnam, with Robin paid to teach English, could help them right their floundering financial ship. It didn't work out quite that smoothly — for a while, they wondered if they would ever be able to return to the U.S. — but their shaky financial state makes this a better book.

Rather than sheltering away in a high-end neighborhood surrounded other ex-patriates and waited on by servants, Esterhammer and her family take up residence in a "regular" Vietnamese neighborhood. They soon find they must padlock their door to keep neighbors from wandering into their house and snooping around. They learn to deal with frequent power outages and floods, and the sounds of karaoke being sung at all times of the day and night.

But there are plusses too. Esterhammer comes to form close bonds with her neighbors, gets to plenty of practice speaking Vietnamese, and learns to cook local foods.

Looking around at her neighborhood, she also gains an appreciation for enjoying life with little money.

"The Vietnamese are philosophical about struggle: Don't look back, tomorrow will be better," she notes.

I loved how open Esterhammer is in telling the story, even when it comes to her family's personal lives. She describes getting breast implants removed in a Vietnamese hospital, and her shock when the woman she is sharing a recovery room with crawls into bed with her. 

When Robin loses most of his teaching jobs, she observes some of his classes and soon discovers why: He is a terrible teacher.

"The lessons were not just sleep-inducing, but PhD-dissertation-on-potting-soil sleep-inducing."

She knocks her husband for sleeping long hours and not being much help around the house.  I was kind of expecting the book to end with a divorce (spoiler alert: It does not).

Esterhammer's encounters with a group of ex-patriate wives in a group she dubs the "Ladies who Lunch Because They're Bored" are painfully comical. (Said one of the wives: "I have no interest in learning about Vietnamese culture.")

Esterhammer's family returned to California two and a half years after they arrived, but she came away with a  love for her adopted homeland.

"If you ever get the chance to become stranded in a foreign country with no money to get home, I recommend Vietnam."

Arizona football fans disappoint

I've seen college football games in eight of the stadiums of the Pac-12 Conference, but I've never had the chance to see the Arizona Wildcats play at their home in Tucson. 

This troubled me. While Arizona has never had a particularly successful football team, I have long had the impression that they have a loyal and committed base of fans. I respected that and wanted to see it in person.

Finally, this past Saturday, I got my chance to watch football at Arizona Stadium. And to my surprise, Arizona fans were not at all what I expected.

It was Family Weekend at the University of Arizona, where my son is a sophomore, so my wife and I joined throngs of other parents from around the country in Tucson. The Saturday night football game against UCLA was the centerpiece of the weekend's activities.

Considering that the Wildcats had lost 16 straight times, it was surprising how much buzz there was on campus about the game. Inside the school bookstore, fans lined up to buy Arizona t-shirts and other spirit wear (the school had urged people to wear white shirts to make it a "White Out" night.)

Pre-game festivities

On the university mall, fans set up a sea of tents and started tailgating a full six hours before kickoff. Music filled the air, along with the smell of barbecues. Fans bedecked in Arizona jerseys and hats played cornhole, tossed the football around and played drinking games. There was tingling sense in the air, that maybe, just maybe, the Wildcats could pull off a big upset that night.

Come game time, more than 43,000 fans filled Arizona Stadium for the game. That wasn't a sell-out but was pretty impressive considering that ESPN had labeled the Wildcats the third-worst team in the nation.

The large crowd was even more remarkable considering the unfriendly reception fans got at the stadium entrance. You would think that a team with the worse losing streak in college football would be thrilled that anyone would come to its games. I imagined something like this:

"Oh, thank you, dear sir for coming. Here’s a velvet pillow to sit on and a souvenir tankard with the beverage of your choice."

In fact, fans at Arizona stadium we’re greeted with all the warmth of a TSA body cavity search. First, there was the long list of prohibited items. No sandwiches. No cookies. No grapes. No purses. No diaper bags. No fanny packs. Once you got that message, you then had to empty all your pockets, go through an x-ray detector and be prepared to be patted down. 

Nothing like treating your fans — some of whom had paid hundreds of dollars for a single ticket —  like criminals.

Despite this, the stadium was buzzing with excitement as the game neared. A rousing pregame video featuring Arizona sports highlights had the crowd cheering.

The Wildcats seemed to be charged up as well — yes, fan support does make a difference — and drove down the field on its first drive to take a 3-0 lead.

UCLA responded with a touchdown, but Arizona came back with a field goal to make it 7-6.  The underdog Wildcats were going toe-to-toe with the heavily favored Bruins. On key plays, fans roared to exhort the home team.

In the closing moments of the first half,  Arizona scored a touchdown on an electrifying trick play, and that was soon followed by an interception of a UCLA pass. The visitors led only 14-13 as the half ended and the crowd was vibrating with the thought of victory. On ESPN, which was broadcasting the game, announcer Dave Flemming said, "You're feeling the energy start to build in this stadium."

And then the strangest thing happened: People began to leave.

It wasn't apparent at first because a lot of people go the concession stands and the restrooms at halftime anyway, but by early in third quarter it was clear that 20% to 25% of the crowd had left midway through a close game.

I understand leaving a game when your team is getting blown out. But this was far from that. Arizona trailed by one and was besting UCLA in total yards and first downs. It remained a one-point game until late in the third quarter, and even after UCLA took a 24-16 lead, Flemming said, "It's still definitely a ballgame here."

Even well into the fourth quarter, the Wildcats could have tied that game with a single touchdown and two-point conversion. 

Somehow this didn't matter to the fans, who were rushing out of the stadium as if they'd just heard that chicken strips were half-price at Cracker Barrel. The stadium's energy deflated like air rushing out of a balloon. 

With seven minutes left in the game, there probably no more than 5,000 fans remained in the stadium. Some doggedly tried to maintain the enthusiasm, but it was no use. If you were watching on TV, it might have seemed that Arizona's football team ran out of gas in the fourth quarter (UCLA won 34-16). But the crowd quit on the team first. While it's hard to say how much the dwindling crowd support affected the team, it certainly didn't help.

I get that following a losing team can be frustrating. I wouldn't blame anyone for simply not coming out to see such a team play. But once you've bought a ticket, commit yourself. Sure, you can walk out of "Fast and Furious" and no one will care. But at a sporting event the energy of the crowd is part of the experience. Arizona fans, you can do better. 

 

NPR interview falls short on border issues

I've grown weary of people who criticize without offering solutions. It's easy to be negative; it's harder to offer realistic alternatives.

I've also grown frustrated with journalists who enable this kind of negativity.

Case in point is the Sept. 24, 2021 NPR interview with immigrant advocate Alicia Schmidt Camacho, who was invited on "All Things Considered" to discuss what should be done about the many migrants attempting to cross the U.S.-Mexico border. I like NPR a lot, but in this case interviewer Audie Cornish allowed Camacho to persistently ridicule U.S. policy with little effort to suggest options.

When Camacho said that "deterrence does not work," Cornish could have asked, "Then what does work?" When she said U.S. immigration policy was a "failure," Cornish could have asked, "What would you do instead?" 

Not only did Cornish not ask those questions, she allowed Camacho to lecture listeners on off-topic points. Yes, we well know that these migrants have traveled a long way and that immigrants fill many jobs in the U.S., but telling us that does nothing to address border issues.

Eventually — though unprompted by Cornish — Camacho did say that she favored "decriminalizing ordinary migration" and dismantling the "large-scale carceral system" used by immigration agencies. 

What does that mean? It sounds like she supports open borders. But why should we have to guess?  Don't let Camacho hide behind academic jargon. Ask her directly: "Do you support opening the borders and allowing everyone in?"

Such pointed questions are not rude. They are necessary. 

Book review: "Flash Boys" by Michael Lewis

In "Flash Boys," author Michael Lewis does something impressive. He takes a complex and esoteric subject — the shadowy practices of Wall Street's high-frequency traders —and makes it accessible to the average reader.

This is a topic that could easily bog down in the minutiae of computer engineering and financial jargon and fog the mind of the most determined reader. Instead, Lewis engages us by turning into the story into a classic battle between good versus evil, even David versus Goliath.

By focusing on the people and not the technicalities, Lewis brings the story alive with a smoothly moving narrative. He describes how high-frequency traders armed with powerful computers profit by detecting investors' buying and selling orders, then racing ahead to get to the stock market first.  The high-frequency traders can then shift the price before the original order arrives, forcing investors to pay more when buying stock or get less when selling.

This all happens in less than a blink of an eye — it is a business measures in milliseconds. It is also a risk-free way for the high-frequency traders to make billions at the expense of investors. 

While Wall Street promotes itself as open marketplace where buyers and sellers can meet, Lewis says the reality is a murky world where dollars disappear into "dark pools" where insiders enrich themselves. Even most Wall Street bankers don't understand how the high-frequency traders are sucking money out of the market, Lewis says.

Into this bleak scenario, Lewis introduces a small group of men — the "Flash Boys" — who set out to expose the problem and right the wrong.

Lewis does a lot right in this book, but I'm frustrated because he doesn't do many things that would have made the book even better.

First, there are no pictures, not even of the central characters. He says of one person, "He didn't look like a Wall Street trader." Ok, but why not include a picture and let us decide? 

Then there's chapter two, which describes the laying of fiber cable from Chicago to New Jersey just for the use of high-frequency traders. This chapter screams for a map, maybe even two or three. But there are none.

Third, a book of this density, with many characters, companies and concepts sprinkled throughout, could really use an index. There is none.

Similarly, because many people come and go in the story, sometimes with big gaps between appearances, a guide with thumbnail descriptions of the characters at the start or back of the book would have been helpful. 

As the book goes on, the "Good vs Evil" theme runs out of steam. Even the main figure, Brad Katsuyama, eventually comes around to say of the high-frequency traders, "They are much less of a villain than I thought." He concludes that they are only doing what is expected on Wall Street.  "The system has let down the investor," says Katsuyama. 

As for the good guys, Lewis portrays them as so squeaky clean that it strains credibility. Everyone else on Wall Street is greedy as hell, but these guys are purely altruistic?  It turns out that each of the Flash Boys are themselves quite rich, so the David versus Goliath analogy does become strained. 

The latter part of the book slows as it focuses on what the Flash Boys consider the solution — a new stock exchange called IEX that Katsuyama and his colleagues are setting up. They claim IEX will level the playing field and eliminate the chance for high-frequency traders to cheat. There is no great final showdown where the villains are vanquished, but there is a small window of hope. 

Book review: "Rough Riders" by Mark Lee Gardner

A good place to start with "Rough Riders," Mark Lee Gardner's 2016 book, is at the end.

In the "Note on Sources," at the back of the book, Gardner explains why this work goes deeper than previous histories of the Rough Riders, the legendary American cavalry led by Theodore Roosevelt in the Spanish-American War. Earlier books failed to take advantage of many first-hand accounts written by soldiers that were published at the time in newspapers around the country, simply because the authors were unaware that those accounts existed. 

But today, with millions of historic newspaper pages available on the Internet, Gardner was able to find those published letters and use them to make a much more complete picture of the Rough Riders. This book, Gardner asserts, is "the first to make use of this previously unknown and significant body of firsthand accounts."

Gardner, whose 2010 book "To Hell on a Fast Horse" was also thoroughly researched, supplemented the letters he found with material culled from unpublished Rough Riders' diaries as well as books and news accounts.

The result is an meticulously detailed book about the Rough Riders, a cavalry made largely from "cowboy" volunteers from the American West the was specially created for the 1898 war on the island of Cuba. The full title of the book is "Rough Riders: Theodore Roosevelt, His Cowboy Regiment, and the Immortal Charge Up San Juan Hill."

Before reading this book, the story of the Rough Riders had long existed on the periphery of my historical knowledge. Yeah, I'd heard of them, but I didn't really know the whole story. I'd also heard a few things that suggested the supposed charge up San Juan Hill either never happened or was blown out of proportion. 

I was first surprised to learn that the Rough Riders were famous even before they even set foot in Cuba and began battle with the Spanish occupiers of the island. The whole creation of the regiment, in part because Roosevelt was involved, was widely reported across the country (Roosevelt was not president yet, but was well-known for his writings and speeches). They were, in effect, celebrity soldiers.

Theodore Roosevelt is my favorite president, but I was dismayed to read how much he and other war hawks selfishly pushed to start this conflict — any war would do — simply so they could join in the battle.

That said, the book makes it clear that the fighting on San Juan Hill (and elsewhere on Cuba) was real and deadly, and that Roosevelt was in the thick of it. Men died all around him. The fact that a bullet never hit him, even though he was often sitting high on his horse Little Texas, is remarkable (and certainly added to his mystique).

Not only did Roosevelt lead the charge up San Juan Hill, he did so twice. The first time, almost no one heard him give the order and only five men followed. They regrouped and the second charge was much more successful.

"Unfortunately, the myth that Roosevelt and his Rough Riders did not charge up San Juan Hill survives to this day, mostly perpetuated by historians who, quite frankly, either have some bias against Roosevelt or have not done their research, or both," Gardner says. 

It's important to note that this book is narrowly about the Rough Riders. I would have liked more "big picture" information on the issues that led to the war and some perspective from the Spanish side, but there's almost none of either.

Even though the Rough Riders suffered through difficult conditions from the start of their training through the end of the war, the soldiers' accounts tend to be upbeat, even "chipper." For instance, one man who was ordered by Roosevelt to stay put in a location exposed to relentless enemy fire, said, "It was a ticklish place, but we'd have lain on a gridiron of hell, if he'd given the order."

Were the soldiers truly so positive? Or was it just not fashionable at that time to complain? Even after reading the whole book I'm not sure. 

If you'd like another good book about Theodore Roosevelt , consider "River of Doubt," the story of his arduous trip through the Amazon in 1914.

Book review: "The Pearl" by John Steinbeck

(This review contains spoilers. A lot of them.)

You want to get rich quick? Think again, suggests John Steinbeck, in "The Pearl."

In this harsh parable, Steinbeck shows sudden wealth ruining the lives of a young Mexican couple named Kino and Juana. And I mean, ruining. In the end, their baby is dead, their house is burned down, many of their neighbors are out to get them, and Kino has had to kill four people defending his family. 

It all starts when Kino, a poor and illiterate pearl diver in a small village in Baja California, finds the "Pearl of the World." The gigantic orb should make him and his family rich, but instead it only brings misery.

"The Pearl" is a short 1947 novella, with only 90 pages in my version. I finished it in two days and it could have been just one with a little more focus.

It is a smoothly engaging tale, starting right from the beginning when a scorpion bites Kino and Juana's baby. Steinbeck's descriptions are evocative. For instance:

"Kino deftly slipped the knife into the edge of shell. Through the knife he cold feel the muscle tighten hard. He worked the blade lever-wise and the closing muscle parted and the shell fell apart. The lip-like flesh writhed up and then subsided. Kino lifted the flesh, and there it lay, the great pearl, perfect as the moon."

In Steinbeck's telling, sudden wealth can not only upend the life of the recipient, but can disrupt the fabric of a community. Kino's pearl exposes greed and treachery among many of the villagers.

One small flaw: A doctor introduced early in the book as a seemingly important character curiously disappears in the latter half.

Also, I wonder about the message. Is Steinbeck suggesting that people should not attempt to improve their quality of life? If they do, is it inevitable that the hand of fate will bring misery and death into their lives?

I don't buy it. Kino hoped that his new wealth could one day send his son to school so the boy could learn to read. What's wrong with that?

Trying out Long Beach's new Amazon Fresh store

Amazon recently opened a new grocery store in my town, Long Beach, California, and I was eager to try it out. After all, the company has promoted its Amazon Fresh stores as offering a "seamless grocery shopping experience" where customers can skip the checkout line.

How well does it work?  I went there for the first time yesterday and while it was interesting, I would not call it "seamless."

Entering the store, I was surprised to see that it had many normal grocery store checkout stations. In fact, I was to learn, you can shop at Amazon Fresh just like other stores, going to a human checker to pay for your items.

But that's not why I came to the store. I want to shop the New Way. So I immediately headed for one of the Amazon Dash carts, a green grocery basket souped up with a video screen and bar code scanning devices.

An Amazon Dash Cart

Almost immediately, a friendly staff worker came over to show me how it works. First, you pull out the Amazon app on your phone and select "In-store Code." This generates a QR code — one of those blotchy ink-blot like squares — that you show to a screen near the handle of the cart. This logs you in; you can then put your phone away.

All the Dash Carts started preloaded with two empty double-bagged paper bags ready to receive your groceries. As the helpful worker explain, as you place items in the cart, a set of readers (small screens) around the perimeter of the cart will see the bar code and add the item to your total.

I had brought two plastic bags of my own, but the worker told me not to place those in the basket, because that would confuse the machine. I had to hang them on plastic hooks at the back of the cart.

My first stop was the produce section, where I tried placing some bananas in the cart. I kind of knew this wouldn't work, since there's no bar code on the bananas. Indeed orange lights lit up on my cart, warning that something wasn't right. I pulled the bananas out, and using the screen on the cart, entered the four-digit "PLU" number. It asked how bananas there were, I entered the number, then placed them in the successfully in the cart.

I picked out some cucumbers and followed the same process. I didn't choose any items that had to be weighed, but there were scales in the produce section if you needed to.

Buying produce always is a bit more complicated than other products no matter what store you're in. If you were using a self-checkout station at any grocery store, you would be entering the number of bananas or the weight of the item at the checkstand. Amazon Fresh has just shifted this to the produce section.

From there, I moved on to items with bar codes. I tossed a small bag of pasta into the cart, and the system successfully read the bar code on the fly. But for a couple other items, I got the Orange Lights of Rejection and had to pull them out and place them more slowly in.

I tested the cart a couple times by placing an item in and then removing it. The screen acknowledged that the item was removed. The screen kept a running total of your purchases, which could be handy to monitor your spending.

The Dash Cart is not set up for a large shopping trip. If you fill up the cart to the brim, the code-reading lights won't be able to see properly. You also can't place items on the shelf under cart.

This Amazon Fresh is an average-sized grocery store, but had slightly less selection of items than normal. It had no diet root beer, for example. The orange juice shelves offered only a few choices.

Finally, I was ready to check out — and this is where the promise of the Amazon Fresh stumbled. You supposedly can simply walk down a dedicated lane with a big green arrow and leave. Your Amazon account be automatically charged

But when I got to that lane, there were two customers with carts in front of me. Two store employees seemed to be checking what they bought. So I waited and pondered the meaning of "seamless."

Trying to leave

Finally, the lane cleared, and the same helpful employee showed how I should double check the total on my screen, and then click accept and then go.

Except I really couldn't. She now told me that I couldn't walk to my car with my cart. The cart couldn't leave the store. 

I hadn't planned on this twist, but I was able to do some quick reorganizing, placing all my items in the two paper Amazon bags and one bag that I had brought, then carrying them out. This is another reason not to fill your cart too full. I suppose I could have moved all my items to one of the regular carts, but I thought Amazon was trying to make shopping easier not harder. 

All in all, I'm underwhelmed by Amazon Fresh. The checkout was not particularly fast and having to hand-carry your groceries to your car is a step backward. Also, the small size of the Dash Cart greatly limits its usefulness. 

Book review: "Cry, the Beloved Country" by Alan Patton

 It took me a long time to read "Cry, the Beloved Country." Decades, really.

That's how long the book sat on the shelf at my house. It was one of those books that I thought I would get to someday.

That day finally came this year, and I pulled it off the shelf. I figured I'd already taken too long to get to a book that is often considered the classic novel of South Africa.

But even with the book in my hands, it took a while to get started. The paperback version I had began with a  three-page "Note on the 1987 Edition," followed by a one-page "Note on the 1959 Edition." That was followed by "Note on the 1948 Edition" (another three pages) and then the foreword, and then an 11-page introduction.  Then, finally, came the book - whew!

So was it worth the wait? "Cry, the Beloved Country" is quite good, though imperfect. I would recommend it for anyone with an interest in South Africa.

I was impressed by how author Alan Patton used a personal story focusing on an aging pastor to illustrate the culture and conditions of South Africa of the 1940s. Perhaps not surprising — since blacks and whites in South Africa at the time lived much different lives — racial issues are a large part of the story. 

The book engages you from the start as main character Stephen Kamalo, receives a letter prompting him to abruptly leave his small village and head to the massive city of Johannesburg, a place he initially finds bewildering. Kamalo is on hunt for, first, his sister, and then his son, both of whom vanished into the amorphous metropolis after leaving the village. 

The hunt keeps the story moving forward, but when it ends, only midway through the book, the story loses much of its impetus. Patton, a South African, clearly wants to show the racial tensions in the country, but seems unsure how to best do so. There are some passages in the midsection of the book, seemingly unfinished, where it's hard to tell whose perspective is being presented. The character of Kumalo's brother rises to some significance in this portion, then disappears from the narrative.

The book regains it's footing in the last third, and finishes strong. An emotional scene between Kamalo and his condemned son had me close to tears.  

The book, and much of the dialog, is written in something of a stilted, old-fashioned format.

"I have come," he said.

"It is good."

"You did not write."

"No, I did not write."

"Where is your husband?"

"I have not found him, my brother."

Taken out of context, the passage seems almost cartoonish. But it works in "Cry, the Beloved Country," because Patton uses it consistently and the rhythm fits with the story.

I did find it strange that there are some characters with continuing roles through the book —"the girl," "the boy," "the young white man" — whose names you never learn. 

Once I finished, I returned to the start of the book and read the notes and foreword. It was interesting to find that the book wasn't even written in South Africa, but in Norway and San Francisco. (Patton was traveling at the time.)

Even more interesting was that the book came to be published largely because of the determined efforts of two friends Patton had in California. They liked the story so much, they queried publishers on Patton's behalf.  When one expressed interest, then spent a frantic few days turning the author's handwritten manuscript into a typed version that barely reached New York in time for a fateful meeting between Patton and the Scribner publishing house. 

Review: "60 days in Pinal County Jail"

I don't know about you, but every time I see a show about the harsh and violent world inside prison, I wonder: "How would I do in jail?" I've never been behind bars, have little-to-no "street smarts," and the last time I was in a fight was 6th grade. Would I be an instant target?  Would I become someone's "bitch"?

So when I saw "60 days in Pinal County Jail" pop up as suggested viewing on Netflix, I thought this  might be my chance to get a realistic picture of life in jail (or, at least, this particular jail).

Pinal County jail inmates

In this show, seven "regular" people are sent undercover as inmates into this Arizona jail. Only the sheriff and a handful of other top officials are aware of their true identities. Each participant is given a "mission" to see what he or she can learn on one of three topics: Drug use, gangs, or "jailhouse operations."

The idea, according to Sheriff Mark Lamb, is to help him learn what is really going on in the jail. But let's face it: What we really want to see is whether the incoming "sheep" will by eaten alive by the prison's wolves.

I was particularly drawn to a slightly pudgy participant named Mark. The sheriff called him "soft" at the start and Mark admitted to being scared. Hey, I thought, that's me! 

"60 Days in Pinal County Jail" goes to some lengths to portray the jail as dangerous. At every opportunity, the show flashes a montage of violent shots (inmates fighting, someone screaming, guards forcibly holding down a prisoner). To emphasize the point, the sheriff and his aides repeatedly state that the subjects are risking their lives.

But once you get past all the bluster, and watch as the cast members enter the jail and settle into daily life, well, not that much happens. While the series stretches to 11 episodes, there's probably only enough good material for seven or eight. 

To gin up some tension, the show has to make the most of some pretty tepid disputes — a stolen can of soda, a TV that's too loud, or Mark's missed chance to sign up for a razor for shaving.  

One thing this show has is swagger, and no shortage of it. The inmates, both men and women, have no problem talking tough. If you played a drinking game where you took a shot every time one of the inmates promised to hurt someone, you'd be shitfaced in no time.

But if you could only drink when an actual punch was thrown, well, you could easily get in your car and drive through a DUI checkpoint after most of the shows. 

There are a few fights, but only between people who choose to fight (the male prisoners have a particular room designated for fighting). The scariest guy on the show actually turns out to be one of the participants, an ex-convict turned chaplain named Abner.

Abner seems to take his play-acting a little too seriously, quickly rising to the number two in the Chicano group in his jail pod, a spot he repeatedly tells us is "The Enforcer." Somewhere along the line he forgets that he supposed to be watching for trouble and not causing it. 

"I lost myself in there," he admits later, adding, "I actually was a gang member in there."

Abner repeatedly stirs up the racial tension in the pod. In one of the most bizarre turns, Abner singles out a a young inmate who is trying to avoid the racial politics, punches him, and then goads another prisoner into landing a few more blows on the youth (who does not fight back). 

Abner isn't the only one of the "cast" (that's what the show calls them) who behaves strangely One of them, a private investigator named Steve who brags ahead of time about how tough he is, causes problems almost the minute he enters the pod. He inexplicably gives the "emergency" extraction single in a non-emergency situation ("I just wanted to see if it would work," he says in the epilog). He then threatens to expose the whole program to the inmates. He is quickly yanked and sent home. 

The three women, Brooke, Vivian and Jasmyn, are explicitly told ahead of time to work independently and not to congregate together. As soon as they enter the jail, they congregate together. 

I liked another participant, a cop named David, who was tough, smart and often the voice of reason in defusing tensions between inmates. But he made two reckless mistakes late in show, revealing a connection to Abner and then confessing his undercover role to one of the guards. This triggers a cascade of events that causes the entire program to be cut short. 

As it turns out, the participant who did the best was "soft" Mark. He stays close enough to the action to have a good view, without finding himself in too deep. Other than Steve (who barely had time to ruffle his sheets before being pulled), Mark is the only participant who didn't drawn suspicion as a snitch.

Book review: "The Answer is ..." by Alex Trebek

It's not really surprising that I would like Alex Trebek's autobiography. After all, I have long been a big fan of "Jeopardy," the quiz show that Trebek hosted for 37 years before his death from cancer in November 2020.

What surprised me about "The Answer is ..." was that not only did I like the book, it made me like Alex Trebek even more than I had.

In the book, Trebek acknowledges that he has long been viewed as "aloof." Of course, it's hard to really know someone through the prism of television, but while I respected him as host of "Jeopardy," I shared the sense that Trebek saw himself a bit above the rest of us.

But in "The Answer Is ...," Alex Trebek reveals a more human side. He describes himself as both "reserved" and "silly." He worries that he is sometimes oversensitive to criticism. He gets frustrated, like we all do, when he calls his bank and can't reach a person.

Trebek emphasizes that he has always tried to keep the focus of "Jeopardy" on the players rather than himself (he insisted on being called the "host," not  the "star," of the show).  

"You could replace me as the host of the show with anybody and it would likely be just as popular," he writes.

It turns out that Trebek is in many ways a modest and down-to-earth guy who loves simple things like crossword puzzles and home fix-it projects. This is a man — a millionaire many times over — who opted to fix his own dryer rather than pay a repairman $200. Why? He loves a challenge.

"That's very important in life. It's one thing to do the same thing well over and over again," he notes. "But try to force yourself into attacking a new project that you've never done before, and say, 'Okay, how do I solve this?'" 

The format of "The Answer Is ..." is unconventional for an autobiography. Rather than a wall-to-wall life story, Trebek offers short vignettes from his life and small selections of thoughts. Most of the chapters are just two or three pages long; he tells a quick story or offers few thoughts, and then ends it. For the most part, it works. I might try it myself if I ever write an autobiography. 

 Among the various things, we learn:

• His actual name is George Alexander Trebek
• He spent less than two days in military college before quitting
• A third grade prize he received for public speaking propelled him to seek a career in broadcasting
• At an event he was hosting in 1967, he met Queen Elizabeth II and they chatted for a surprisingly long five minutes. The next day, when he saw her again, she didn't remember him. 
• Worried that he was too clean-cut, he started joking about having a drinking problem (in fact, he preferred 1% milk)
• He had a habit of arriving 10 minutes early for everything. 

There are a few gaps. For example, I would have liked to hear about the trips he made as part of the show — to the Galapagos Islands, Machu Picchu, and the Dead Sea, among others — but he doesn't talk about them.

Also, the book includes three photos of him in costumes from the New York Metropolitan Opera. This deserves at least a short explanation, but it's not there.

What is there are honest thoughts about the value of family, and hard looks at the debilitating effects of pancreatic cancer. 

"One taping day early in my treatment, my stomach cramps got so bad that I was on the floor writhing in pain," he writes. He still did the show that day.

"Aloof" or not, Alex Trebek had a classy final act. He wrote the book knowing that it would likely be his last opportunity to describe his outlook on life.

“My life has been a quest for knowledge and understanding, and I’m nowhere near having achieved that," he reflects. "And it doesn’t bother me in the least. I will die without having come up with the answer to many things in life."

He adds: "I'd like to be remembered first of all as a good and loving husband and father, and also as a decent man who did his best to help people perform at their best. Because that was my job."

Book review: "Answers in the Form of Questions" by Claire McNear

It would have been easy for Claire McNear to have written a half-ass book about "Jeopardy." Plenty has been written about the long-running TV quiz show in magazines, newspapers and books, and there have been multiple "behind the scenes" short documentaries and videos. 

McNear could have easily taken pieces from all these sources, cobbled together something resembling a book and sent it off to the publisher without breaking a sweat.

Fortunately for all of us, McNear is not a half-ass journalist. For "Answers in the Form of Questions," she went all out — interviewing every significant person involved in the making of the show, as well as notable and not-so-notable contestants and devoted fans.  She goes back stage to watch tapings, spends a night playing bar trivia alongside some of the show's past champions, and visits quiz competitions to see "Jeopardy" wannabes in training.

"Many fans are surprised to learn just how sportlike 'Jeopardy' can be," McNear writes. "It has many of the hallmarks that we associate with sports: a prospect pipeline, rigorous physical (and, yes, mental) preparation, a hall of fame, and strategic innovators revered decades later for their additions to the game, who sometimes go on to assume the role of coaches."

 "Answers in the Form of Questions" is a terrific book that both serious and casual "Jeopardy" fans will enjoy. McNear details the history of the show, the background of host Alex Trebek, the testing and audition process for would-be contestants, the mysteries of the writers room, and the curious subculture of "Jeopardy" fanatics. 

Even if you think you know a lot about the show you'll learn something in this book. Did you know that John McCain, the future senator and presidential candidate, was a one-day winner in 1965? That you can't wager $69 or $666 on the show?  That Alex Trebek actually hosted "Wheel of Fortune" before "Jeopardy"?

I learned that before the Final Jeopardy portion, show staff have players write "Who is" or "What is" on their video screen so they don't forget during the critical 30-second countdown. I didn't know that there's a "Jeopardy" bar scene the evening after taping, since many contestants stay in the same hotel. I had never heard of notorious contestant Barbara Lowe, who appeared on "Jeopardy" and other shows using fake names. 

"Answers in the Form of Questions" digs into game strategy tips shared by former players, including wagering tactics, and the importance of knowing how to use the buzzer (or "signaling device," as the show calls it).  You may never have heard about the "enable light," but after you read this book you'll know there is a raging debate in the "Jeopardy" community about whether or not to use if for buzzer timing.

One thing the book is not about is the Alex Trebek's battle with pancreatic cancer, which led to his death in November 2020. McNear only spends a few paragraphs on it, including noting that original "Jeopardy" host Art Fleming also died of pancreatic cancer. If you want more about Trebek, consider reading the book he released before hid death, "The Answer is..."