Author Archives: WorldWideWeber

Eclipsed

In Washington, DC, the solar eclipse of 2017 was not total, but it was awesome nonetheless. Equipped with safety glasses, we saw the moon obstruct about 90% of the sun, the mostly sunny day became noticeably dimmer as the eclipse … Continue reading

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Phew!

“There are less people here today than yesterday.” It’s fewer, people! Fewer people!* It’s an easy rule. I think you can handle it, my friends. If you’re talking about a bunch of things (multiple objects), you use fewer, fewest. Example: … Continue reading

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Assessment

I gave him four months to do something right in his catastrophically miscast role as president of the United States. It is now clear that Trump is the most ignorant, stupid, selfish, self-centered, self-absorbed, needy, cruel, unhealthy, churlish, uncouth, petty, insular, … Continue reading

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Eulenspiegel’d

Our poor little language gets pranked again. It’s Thursday, and if you happen to be in Arlington, Virginia, and if you like oysters, you can eat raw ones at a certain restaurant, from 4:00 p.m. “til supplies last.” (I’ll wait while … Continue reading

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Bottled

The Cleveland classical radio station WCLV made me do it, twenty years ago. In the month preceding Valentine’s Day in 1997, they kept reading a love poem by a British poet laureate and asking: “Can you write something that good?” … Continue reading

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Bicikl

He steals a bicycle and eventually has a run-in with a cop. Beyond that, I’m not sure what’s going on in this song by Leteči Potepuhi (The Flying Tramps). I have a funny feeling it’s not standard Slovene.

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TRiUMPh

Now that the shock has worn off (and it was only a shock because the supposed pros who do the polls did a piss-poor job of it)—now that the shock has turned to mere wonder, I am filled with almost … Continue reading

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Warmup

A great way to experience 22,000 years of global temperature fluctuations: Randall Munroe made the timeline, so full credit to him. It is an extremely long vertical strip of great information that is a challenge to fully apprehend. I just turned … Continue reading

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Quantum

Quantum was a wonderful student magazine published by the National Science Teachers Association from 1990 to 2001. Born in the heady days of perestroika, it was a collaboration with the renowned Russian journal Kvant. Sadly, just at its early adopters were graduating … Continue reading

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Alert

There have been reports of an old man driving around near schools trying to entice students into his car with promises of free tuition.

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