Auckland, not Oakland

     Michael Bassett unwittingly points out the advantage of e-mail;
     "Specifying which place you want doesn't always work. When I was a graduate student at Duke in the early 1960s the cable line back to New Zealand went through Oakland, California. I would get put through to that point, then request an onward connection with Auckland, at which point the voice invariably would answer "But you've got it". Phone lines are so clear these days, but then it was hard to disentangle the problem, and wasn't helped by the fact that only one operator in Oakland out of every three had heard of Auckland.
     By the way, Auckland isn't a bad place to be right now. New Zealand has just successfully defended the America's Cup, 5-0, against Italy. Should we rename it?"


     My reply: No, let Oakland change its name, like the World War II U.S. private named Hitler who, in reply to taunts about his name and suggestions that he change it, said "Let the other guy change his name." But, since WAISers are in a name-calling phase, you might explain it.
     As a non-competitive type, I deem yacht racing all wet. But you might explain why Italians went wild about THEIR victory.

Ronald Hilton - 3/2/00