If we have good vision we are capable of seeing about 5,000 stars on a clear night. That is hardly a good start. The latest calculation of astronomers for the total number of stars in the universe is 70 sextillion. That...
This evening I found myself staring into the refrigerator. I wasn’t really hungry so what was I doing? I must be a conditioned lab rat and something triggered a “Go to the fridge” response. Without thinking I was going to put unnecessary...
My four-year-old granddaughter approached me today with a blank piece of paper in one hand and a handful of markers in the other. She was all excited about writing me a letter. Soon she returned with a long list of squiggly lines and...
Our world is such a complicated place it is difficult to do really good things. We give clothes for people in Africa and while the clothes do arrive in Africa they end up being sold in the markets for prices that undercut the local...
When one rides through the Green Mountains of Vermont on a mid-summer day the overwhelming thought runs through your mind that it should be illegal for people to be allowed to live here. Gorgeous, well-kept farms and lawns sit atop rolling hills back dropped...
Galileo discovered the horizontal motion of a falling object is independent of its vertical motion. If I should shoot a bullet parallel to the ground and simultaneously drop an object from a height equal to the distance of the barrel of the gun from...
Our world teems with life. Scientists have labeled over 1.8 million different species and estimate that we are about one percent finished. Obviously it is the really little ones we haven’t named yet. One could spend one’s entire life just in his...
As I was about to leave for school my wife called to warn me to be extra careful on the back road into our college. The local town policeman was sitting under his favorite tree with his radar gun. She had gone...
This evening in class a student asked me, “What is a diphthong?” I didn’t have a clue. I did not know if it was some form of phoneme or morpheme so I did what any wise man would do. I asked my...
I am sitting here looking at a list of movie reviews. I am fascinated by the stars used to rate the viewing value of a film. It must be very satisfying to be in a five star film. And, how horrible it...