A Doll Comes To Visit

You are a fifth-grade girl who comes home from school to find a doll on your front porch. The doll looks like you, is dressed like you, and there is something about the eyes. Who left it? Why is it here? And what makes this doll so special?

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With a Little Help From My Friend

Jim Jenkins is an ace detective who solves the most difficult crimes. Yet he always works alone. Or does he?

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The Boy Who Could Wiggle His Ears

Learning how to wiggle your ears is really hard. But you can do it if you keep trying. And if you learn to keep trying, no problem is too big. So if you can wiggle your ears, you can do anything!

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Original Poem — On Squash

The nice people on The Pangolin Review website have published one of my poems — Issue 4, 8 July (https://thepangolinreview.wixsite.com/mypoetrysite/current-issue )!  Unfortunately, you have to scroll down and hunt for it, so I’ll copy it here to save you the trouble.   On Squash How did the vegetable squash get its name? For something you

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In Praise of National Parks

It’s been awhile since I’ve been in a national park.  But on a recent trip with family, I visited three — Rocky Mountain, Yellowstone, and Badlands.  Over the years, I’ve visited every major park except one — Yellowstone.  I’d heard so much about this park, and I was eager to see for myself. I wasn’t

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The Importance of Sleep

So many people I know complain about not getting enough sleep, yet it is essential to good health.  If you fall into that category, you’ll be interested in a new book Nodding Off: The Science of Sleep from Cradle to Grave by sleep researcher Alice Gregory of Goldsmiths, University of London. I discovered this work

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What If We Had to Eat Insects?

The world’s population is continuing to grow; we could have as many as 11.2 billion people by 2100 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Projections_of_population_growth ).  If that projection comes true, how will we feed everyone? One solution may be to eat insects.  That’s not as far-fetched as it sounds.  This is what early mammals ate, and this ability has been

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Predicting the Future

I know how tough it is to predict the future; I’ve watched Disneyland go through multiple incarnations of Tomorrowland.  Yet we keep trying. Like in the AARP Bulletin of June 2018 with its cover article “What’s Next: How Your Life Will Get Better in the Coming Years.”  Five areas of our lives are examined, and

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Is There a Link Between Crying and Airplanes?

You learn something new every day — I’ve flown on a lot of airplanes, but except for screaming kids, I’ve never thought about crying.  And yet, I’ve just found an article entitled “This Is Why You’re More Likely to Cry on an Airplane, According to a Psychologist” by Mahita Gajanan (http://time.com/5274209/airplane-cry- emotion/?, the photo is

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Are Nightmares All Bad?

Dreams are flaky enough, and nightmares are worse.  But even if you have nightmares, are they bad for you? They could be.  In an article “Nightmares Are Scary. But Are They Bad For Your Health?” by Markham Heid (http://time.com/5287932/are-nightmares-bad-for-you/?),  Michael Nadorff, an assistant professor of psychology at Mississippi State University and director of the school’s

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Around the World in 80 Trees

If you’re interested in a summer read and are a nature lover, I’ve just stumbled across an interesting-sounding book.  Entitled Around the World in 80 Trees by Jonathan Drori, the author uses plant science to explain how trees affect our everyday lives.   You can  guess some of the contents — California redwoods certainly deserve

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Starlings and Science, or What is Murmuration?

If you are a bird lover, you may have marveled at how great flocks of starlings move in unison.  There are several excellent examples on YouTube, like this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eakKfY5aHmY .  So how do they do it? Science has been wondering the same thing.  It’s only been recently that we’ve had the tools to observe

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In Praise of … Spiders?

What if I told you that spiders, those universally reviled members of the bug world, are really valuable and should be protected? Matt Bertone, Extension Associate in Entomology at North Carolina University, makes that point in “A Case Against Killing Spiders” ( http://earthsky.org/earth/case-against-killing-spiders? ).  He says spiders are important to both indoor and outdoor ecosystems. What’s more,

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