Smoke rings yield to cosmic calculations

It’s basketball crazy time and I’ve been watching my share of it over the past couple days. The best so far has been the Kentucky/Santa Clara game where a 3-pointer looked to secure the upset win for the Broncos. But a quick inbound sidestepped a  Santa Clara timeout, and Otega Oweh raced down the floor with four seconds left and heaved a 3-ball just inside the half-court line that banked in at the buzzer to send the game into OT. Kentucky would take advantage of a no-call on a travel and some stingy defense to avoid the upset.
Other than that, it’s been pretty chalky. So watching the 10 pt. to 59 pt.?! wins the rest of the day, had me thinking about another type of madness.
Have you ever thought about how fast we’re moving even when we’re standing still? My nephew was on his way back from college Friday night and we were trying to time out the trip to when he’d get home from Oskaloosa. Someone said he’s going 73 to 75 so he’d be home in a couple hours.
I happened to say out of the blue, well actually he’s going about 1,175 mph. I mean, we’re just sitting there watching hoops, so it was a moment to interject something a little deeper than “if Bennett Stirtz had any support, Iowa would be dangerous.”
I started thinking to myself about speed and how we all move and don’t realize we’re moving at all until we look up and see the sun in a different spot than it was an hour ago.
The math on this is simple, but not.
In basic form, the earth spins one complete revolution in 24 hours. That’s 24,901 miles as the earth's circumference. So we just use 25,000 miles for easier math while sitting on a wonderful night on the patio with a Busch Light and a cigar. I don’t inhale deep, just enough to blow smoke rings and impress the rest.
So the math says that’s we're all constantly moving at about 1,100 mph. We go outside every day and don’t get slammed against the house or go rolling butt over belly down the sidewalk. We’re used to it. We were born used to it. I’m moving that fast just sitting here in my chair typing. My hair isn’t blowing from that speed, and it’s also not blowing because I don’t have much left.
There’s gravity involved, too. It holds us down as the earth spins to the east. So when Angela Roller is out running forever the streets of Fort Madison, she may be running at 5 mph, but she’s actually moving at 1,105 mph. When I’m walking from my truck to the house to get a ham and cheddar on pumpernickel, I’m moving at like 1,102 mph. So, in the grand scheme of things, I’m doing just slightly less than Roller, about .003%. Granted, my exercise is in 20-foot segments and not miles, but I’m hearing that short bursts of exercise are better than prolonged, intense sessions. So I’m feeling pretty good about the sandwich, and maybe an apple.
I brought this random thinking up to my daughter Saturday morning on the phone. She and I were laughing about what would happen if the world just stopped spinning. In the moment, it wasn’t depressing because first, I’m not sure it could happen, and second, we probably wouldn’t be around to assess the amazement of it all.
So I did a little research and apparently, yeah, Facebook experts indicate it would be catastrophic. But I tend to disagree. At my age, I can’t even stop my momentum from a walk on a dime, so getting a marble that weighs, oh, let’s just say 13.72 septillion pounds (that’s 10 to the 25th power) or six billion trillion metric tons, to stop immediately is ridiculous, right?
We can’t honestly think that the earth could stop on a dime. The universe is awe inspiring in mass and potential, but there’s no way to imagine it stopping for a spin break. If something slammed into it hard enough to stop its rotation… no more pumpernickel. Quick research indicates humanity would come to an end. Tidal waves, everything crashing eastward, buildings, trees, people -  they say even the wind associated with that would be devastating.
But, what if after our tripping, rolling and crashing down Avenue E, intertia brought us to rest in the rubble of the bricks of the old ISP or whatever the wave of destruction looked like? It’s crazy to assume survival, but some would survive out of pure luck. Then what?
Eternal dawn in one spot. Eternal noon at another, Eternal moonlit nights for others. And only moonlit nights. I’m not sure Alliant is prepared for the earth to hit the brakes.
The experts say anything embedded in the granite of the earth would have a chance to withstand a quick stop. I just can’t get behind the premise of an abrupt global 'errrrt'.
If the earth was going to slow to a stop I believe the sun would have to explode first and then stopping the earth would be a moot point because our planet would either blow up, too, or be blast into a cosmic pinball game that would very likely increase the speed at which humanity is hurtling through the cosmos. Our global spin is caused by inertia generated from the gravitational pull of the sun. Anyone who’s looked knows we are on a galatic collision course with the sun, but it’s billions of years away, we hope. And it actually stands to reason that with each revolution that speed around the sun increases exponentially, so that time in relative terms for collision with the sun gets more near. However, the energy of that very dynamic is what keeps us moving - keeps the sun “rising” and “setting”; gives us a gentle breeze that blows my cigar smoke rings from the patio, and fakes us into believing we are stationary on this world.
We are not stationary on this world. We’re all moving at 1,100 mph plus, so we might as well  - enjoy the ride.
I’ve got a dinner bet on the Hawkeyes and Florida game tomorrow with my other nephew. He has to buy dinner for three when we get together this summer, against my brother and I buying dinner for two. That’s the spread…one other meal on a straight up Iowa win. I didn’t know Florida had some 7’9” dude, nor did I know they would beat Little House on the Prairie by 59 points in round one.
Looks like I’m buying dinner. I'll keep my hand on my drink because we’ll eat it going 1,100 mph. But that’s Beside the Point.
Chuck Vandenberg is editor and co-owner of Pen City Current and can be reached at Charles.V@PenCityCurrent.com.