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FOUR SEASONS BREEZE | JANUARY 2025 21 By Steve Beno Do you remember the movie e Talented Mr. Ripley? It starred Matt Damon. Netf lix created a remake of it, really of the book both were based on. Anyway, in the Netf lix version, called Ripley, there's a scene showing a clock tower with the time at precisely six o'clock, yet the bell from the tower rang only three times. A later scene showed the time at 12 o'clock; yet the clock only rang six times. Let's put aside the coincidence that both rings were precisely half of what the actual time was. What I'm pointing out is that as soon as the bells started to ring, I started to count. Just as when I go up a staircase, I count the stairs. Just as when I Waterpik my teeth, I count the spaces. Speaking of teeth, it wasn't until I was an adult that I realized that my grandfather was not so unique that he grew three sets of teeth but rather that the third set my grandmother spoke of was really his false teeth. Fortunately, I've had better luck with my own teeth. Some of that must be hereditary (but not from that grandpa). But some is because I pay inordinate attention to my teeth. I brush twice a day, f loss, use a Waterpik, and rinse my mouth out many times a day. I must admit, however, I have not achieved perfection. I only have 31 teeth. You see, I thought I would both save money and receive extra attention if I went to the Loma Linda School of Dentistry instead of a regular dentist. That was a bad choice for me. One, I didn't save money. Two, while I did receive extra attention, it was only because an experienced dentist wasn't looking in my mouth, thus resulting in exams that ran for hours. I can't say for sure, but perhaps the dentist I now go to could have saved that third molar. Thus, instead of counting eight spaces when I Waterpik each quarter of my mouth, one of those quarters gets only a count of seven. Now I don't think my counting amounts to an obsession, I don't "have" to count. If I don't find myself counting, that's just fine. But I do admit to being very tied to metrics. I'm constantly measuring my heart rate, gear, angle and feet of climb, and air temperature when I'm riding my bike. If I were the only one so interested, there wouldn't be apps like Strava and Garmin (you surely remember those from last July's column). So, the subject of counting got me to wondering if there are any apps geared to that subject. One doesn't have to wonder too long since one can search the app store for "counting" and find several. (But first another diversion. What's wrong with "one"? Oh no, still another diversion. We all know that a period goes inside the quotation mark at the end of a sentence. But what of a question mark? Turns out it can go inside or outside depending on whether the quote itself is a question (inside) or, as in this case, the sentence is (outside). Now back to the first diversion (at least in this paragraph). Why has the word "one" been relegated to obscurity in favor of, say, "they"? (Outside.) One is a perfectly good pronoun generally used in the singular but could have been adapted to plural just as easily as the plural they has been adapted to singular. Clearly, that's a battle I've lost, but not willingly. There's an app called Count This. It can count similar objects in a photo. "Logs, metal pipes and copper tubes; stacks, clusters, and piles; bars and rebars; steel rods; or any densely packed objects." Take a picture and the app will do the counting. You remember contests to guess the number of jelly beans in a big jar; I'm pretty sure this app can't count them. Count That Now is a tally counting app. The basic screen has a plus sign, a minus sign, and a tally. One nice thing about this app is you can choose a screen that's mostly the plus sign so adding to the tally can be easily done without having to look at your phone. Counter Tally Count is a basic tally counter with the added feature of keeping tallies of several things at once. The example screen shows gym visits, days without certain things, apples eaten, number of stars. Then there is Counter +. Just as I was thinking these counting apps are mostly the same, one review of Counter + says, "the developers went above and beyond when it came to layout, design themes, and the overall seamless presentation of the counter." But, for me, the most interesting counting app I found is called Tasbih Counter Lite: Dhikr (there's also a pro version). Google tells me dhikr (remembrance or reminder in Arabic) "is a form of Islamic worship in which phrases or prayers are repeatedly recited for the purpose of remembering God." Tasbih is a form of dhikr that involves saying "Glory be to Allah" a certain number of times using "the fingers of the right hand or a misbaha [a string of counting beads] to keep track of counting." This app keeps a prayer tally and "gives vibration and sound alerts so you can keep counting your prays [sic.] without looking at your phones." (One last diversion. Coincidental with my recent interest in the Jewish Torah, I've learned that the Islamic holiday of Eid al- Adha, as Wikipedia tells us, interestingly honors "the willingness of Abraham to sacrifice his son as an act of obedience to God's command.") If you use an app you'd like to share with others, let me know at steve.benoff@verizon.net. THERE'S AN APP FOR THAT! Oh, the joy of counting! Ah, ah, ah!

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