Recent Comments

1. 4 days ago on FoxTrot Classics

   Something ironic I’ve discovered about people’s understanding of math. My daughter is severely dyslexic and has trouble adding 1 and 1 (or any other arithmetic problem). Yet she excels at mathematics, especially algebra (our rule is she needs to get at least a 90% on any assignment before moving to the next (we homeschool so we make the rules); between Algebra 1 and Algebra 2, I think she’s had to repeat 3 assignment, all due to arithmetic errors). Yet when she struggles with arithmetic in life (her biggest problem is keeping track of which is higher and which is lower in numbers, so 2+2 might equal 0 in her mind), people assume she can’t do math and give her grief since both of her parents are engineers.

2. 6 days ago on Overboard

   When my Maine C**ns (apparently that breed is banned by this website) were a year or so old, they were bad to chew up everything (we lost several pairs of shoes to them), so we decided to try giving them pig’s ears to chew on instead. I gave each of them one and within 5 minutes, they were ignoring one of the ears and fighting over the other. Another time, we were visiting some friends (who had a pit) with our lab-pit mix. The dogs got along great, but ours (Nicky, who was still only a puppy) would get tired before the other (Sequoya). Sequoya quickly figured out that if she jumped in my lap, Nicky would get jealous enough to re-engage with her. I’ve decided that animals are really not much different than toddlers – though toddlers are easier to potty-train.

3. about 1 month ago on Calvin and Hobbes

   Gross in English used to mean big or great. It’s fascinating to study how words change over time. I’ve been listening to a podcast on the history of the English language and it’s been really eyeopening.

   Give the history of a bakers dozen, I have to agree that it’s 169. A baker’s dozen originated in late-middle, early-modern English history when bakers would cheat customers by making loafs look bigger than they were. As a result, a king (can’t remember which) passed an edict that all bread loaves had to weigh a certain amount. Since bread was usually sold in packs of 12, the edict specifically called out the weight of a dozen loaves. However, since measuring equipment was not perfect and the weight of each loaf was variable (even to scrupulously honest bakers), they started adding an additional loaf (these were essentially what we would call buns) into the packages to ensure it weighed enough if someone tried to check. Therefore, if someone wanted a dozen dozen-sized packs of bread, he would get 169 loaves to ensure each pack was heavy enough.

4. about 1 month ago on Calvin and Hobbes

   I was bullied from the time I started school until around 10th grade. What finally stopped it, I got in several fights where my crazy trumped my naturally gentle manner (I was the big kid, so I was a safe target as if / when I fought back, I’d be labeled the bully no matter what). In one case, I dragged a kid’s face over the parking lot. I got in a lot of trouble with the school (though not my family who always wanted me to fight back – my grandfather even gave me a $20 reward after the first fight), but my bullies started ignoring me. It still wasn’t a pleasant environment, but it was far better than being bullied. I was never really happy until college where I finally had friends. I’m not saying this is the only / best way to handle bullying, but it did work. Unfortunately, today, you might get arrested for hitting a bully (it actually happened to a friend’s son).

5. 7 months ago on FoxTrot

   Every time I hear that song (and I love The Coasters), I can’t help but think about the local radio station that wrote a parody of Charlie Brown during the first Gulf War: “Saddam Hussein, Saddam Hussein, He’s insane, Saddam Hussein; He’s gonna get caught, just you wait and see; ‘Why is everybody dropping bombs on me?’”

6. 7 months ago on FoxTrot

   I do try to use the sleep period for a large part of my intermittent fasting. If I’m going to fast for 36 hours (i.e. 6p on Sun to 6a on Tues) (which I do 3x per week per my Dr.‘s instructions), 16 of those hours is while I’m asleep (except when the fasting gets my energy up and I can’t sleep). It does make it a little easier.

7. 7 months ago on Non Sequitur

   I could use someone to hold up disclaimer signs in my everyday conversations. I have a dry wit and tend to use hyperbole, sarcasm, and devil’s advocacy in my everyday speech. I can’t count the number of times I’ve heard my wife say something after me that starts, “What he means is…”.

8. 10 months ago on Non Sequitur

   I remember hearing once that the reason Buffalo, NY has such bad weather is that it’s the point where the cold air from Canada meets the hot air from Washington.

   Early in my career, I was in charge of building the first exhaust nozzle for a new jet engine. We were ahead of schedule, but the rest of the engine (called the gas generator) was running late. I asked if, since the only purpose of a gas generator was to generate hot air for the nozzle to convert into thrust, would it made sense to test our product by hooking it up to the U.S. Capitol.

9. almost 2 years ago on Calvin and Hobbes

   Makes me think of this:When I consider Your heavens, the work of Your fingers,The moon and the stars, which You have set in place;What is man that You think of him,And a son of man that You are concerned about him?

10. almost 2 years ago on Non Sequitur

    Back in the 90’s, one of the government buildings in Atlanta (I think it was the Richard B. Russell building, but I’m not certain) was renovated. During the clean-up afterwards, the cleaning crew threw away a paint drop cloth. Well it turns out that the drop cloth was actually a $100K painting the government had commissioned for the building. The artist threw a hissy fit when he heard; my question was always, if art is indistinguishable from garbage, is it really art?