Author Archives: Bob Welbaum

Happy Birthday, Aspirin

We like to think that our ancestors were pretty limited when it came to available medications, but that’s not entirely true.  Granted, they didn’t have the modern miracle drugs, but they did have their own arsenal of remedies.  I saw this first-hand in Egypt where I learned how effectively inhaling vapors from mint extract in

Read More

Happy Birthday, Dr. Seuss!

Whenever I try to write rhyming poetry, a strange things happens — it sounds very Seussian.  I didn’t plan it that way, but the similarity is unmistakable.  But I shouldn’t be surprised, because Dr. Seuss has been influencing kids for eighty years now. March 2 was the good doctor’s birthday.  In tribute, here is his

Read More

How to Rate Our Presidents?

I just ran across an article published earlier in February that ranks the U.S. presidents according to a survey of 91 presidential historians as reported by C-SPAN.  This updates the last C-SPAN survey compiled in 2009. The best and the worst haven’t changed since that previous survey.  These historians consider the top presidents to be

Read More

Do Animals Dream?

You may have wondered if you pet can dream like you do.  Is there any way to find out? There may be.  When we dream, we’re in Rapid Eye Movement  (REM) sleep, when your eyes move rapidly and there’s lots of electrical activity in the brain. (By the way, REM sleep was  discovered in 1953.) 

Read More