My Own Thoughts

Go toBaby Name Wizard: Namevoyager and input letters to see how popular a name has been in the last 120 years. My personal name, not nickname, is not one of the top 1000 girls’ names in that time period. from File it Under, who filed it under “Time Waster of the Day”

According to Live Science, the Sahara was a great place to live for a few thousand years- ten thousand years ago.

Good news: “Some 80 percent of a person’s risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease is genetic.” (No one in any generation that I know of- and I know of four- had Alzheimer’s.) Bad news: The genetic influence to alcoholism has been studied since the 1970s, when twin studies first revealed this link. In April of this [...]

That is the topic of Wynn and Wiggins’ book Quantum Leaps in the Wrong Direction. It is interesting on scientific reasoning. And I was surprised to find that Democritus believed in atoms in 420 BC. He thought that a big thing, like a beach, was made of smaller things, like grains of sand and that [...]

Casting out Nines had “Grim News about Reading Skill” and 11D had “Boys and Reading” where she asked for suggestions on how to teach her boys to love reading.

I’ve just finished reading Scientific American’s Ask the Experts. It is purported to be “answers to the most puzzling and mind-blowing science questions.” I didn’t find it THAT great. But it was good and I did learn some. (Always a goal in my life.) According to my understanding of pages 216-17, a whip “cracking” goes [...]

Chamber’s Book of Days from 1869 is available. It includes superstitions, biographies, poems, customs, traditions, and histories of places and events, among many other things. It makes for fascinating reading. Again, thanks to Mirabilis.

According to “Megadeath” at Discover.com it was a hemorraghic fever, native to Mexico and only found when severe drought is followed by a wet period. The Aztecs knew smallpox; they even had their own name for it. But the horrible death that wiped most of them out, they called something else. It is fascinating reading. [...]

is a book by Claudia Dreifus in which she interviews scientists for the NYT. Then she went back and followed up for the book. It was interesting but not fascinating. The most interesting thing was that the “Math Wizzes” (her words) were all physicists.

Wizbang has a post on instructions for Democratic canvassers that tells them to look for Jesus fish on the car, flags, bumper stickers, well-tended gardens, and expensive cars. If they came to my house they would be misled. Yes, there is an expensive car in the driveway. It’s a lease. And that RV? It belongs [...]

before you heat up in exercise, is the advice du jour, according to Reuter’s. Researchers found that when they outfitted male cyclists with special “precooling” garments before a workout in the heat and humidity, the athletes showed cooler body temperatures, lower heart rates and less sweating. The cool down came courtesy of shirts and pants [...]

My eldest will turn 15 this next month. I have been thinking that we should institute a graduated driving plan, even more than Texas might have. Reuter’s said that a study has found that there are less fatal crashes with such a plan. Permutations on the plans include: * Minimum age of 15-1/2 for obtaining [...]

The place I wore my HRT patch twice in a row (bad plan) still itches three weeks later. And my behind hurts. I can either stand for two hours or sit for it. With a hurting behind. Sometimes being a teacher bites.

If they have a 12-step program for this, I haven’t heard of it. So it must not yet be listed as a problem by the Am. Psych. Assoc. Good. While that is still true, I am going to glom onto the meme created by Imperfect Genius and answered by Atypical Homeschool. 1. What country/region/state do [...]

Error Theory says the crescent design is back for the Flight 93 Memorial. Follow this link and give the National Park Service your comments. Try not to be ugly. It’s not the fault (probably) of the guy reading it that they’ve gone back to this design. I said they shouldn’t do it, ever. I mentioned [...]

my part of it anyway, in one post. Great post, too. Read it at Gates of Vienna. The boys will be reading it in history later this year. And writing a response.

This weekend I went to an antique shop in Lubbock, Grand Central Station Antiques on Ave Q. I found a lot of cool things, but I bought three Depression Era glass pieces, all elegant glass. (Depression glass= the free stuff they gave away with purchases. Elegant glass= the stuff you had to buy.) I got [...]

Not being a The Simpsons fan, I did not know this was a not-word when I read it in one of my favorite blogs today. So I clicked on the link the author gave which sent me to Wikipedia and neologisms. That was NOT was I was looking for, so I entered “cromulent definition” into [...]

My 13 year old whipped this out in less than an hour in response to a requirement by the homeschool tutoring/teaching ministry that has been newly instituted. I was amazed. And thrilled. I have to say that, given only a few sentences, I would describe my relationship with Jesus as follows: Life, like a rushing [...]

Here’s a plan for studying artists and art history. Maybe I could use some of this for 1900s artists. Like Rockwell. I’d need to study up on them. But maybe the book she recommends would help.