Stories Short and Strange
17 short stories for general audiences ranging from the unusual to the unbelievable to the just plain strange.
Buying Manhattan
It’s a common story in history — how the Indians sold Manhattan island for a few dollars worth of trinkets. As a history nerd who has done some traveling, I know that history is never as simple as recounted in standard history books. Therefore, a segment of the May 24, 2015 edition of The Writer’s
How to Tell if it’s a Real Fire Drill
A final thought on this school year — The last week of actual school (the week before finals) we had a fire drill and a tornado drill. You may wonder what’s the point (as I did) but there are requirements to be met and apparently two more squares needed to be filled. I was discussing
Who Was James Smithson?
You have heard of the Smithsonian Institution? The man who provided the money for this famous organization was one James Smithson. He is described on page 4 of the June 2014 issue of Smithsonian magazine — He studied coffeemaking, human tears and snake venom, and published 27 scientific papers. His brain, a friend said, was “fruitful
A Poem For Memorial Day
The Patriot Jerry is a patriot, he loves his country dear. He waves the flag on July 4th, he makes his feelings clear. He fancies himself vigilant, his loyalty is defined. But when it comes the time to vote, It tends to slip his mind. He thinks the world of veterans who‘ve come home from
What Have I Gotten Myself Into?
Since I’ve been working as a substitute teacher, and for years was taking almost any job that came along, I’ve caught myself asking that question regularly. Like the time I had an afternoon job teaching high school Health. I was there a bit early, at the end of the period before I was to take
Some Thoughts on the End of the School Year
I’ve been substitute teaching for the same teacher for six of the past seven weeks. This is my last week — the last school week before finals. The seniors had their last day today. Overall they’ve been great kids and teachers do form an emotional attachment with their students. But you still have a job
Do You Like Apples?
This afternoon I was out spraying apple trees. Between me and my neighbor, we have five apple trees of different varieties. Mine are just maturing; hers are prolific. This looks like a good year for apples. The complication is about the time my trees matured and started bearing fruit in quantity, I realized I really
Some Thoughts on Raising Children
“Teach your children well,” Crosby, Stills and Nash It’s not easy raising children today. Although I don’t have kids myself, I learned all about modern child-rearing by observing my best friend and her offspring. Like when I dropped by and was met at the door by her then-four-year-old daughter. “Me Butt-head,” she proudly proclaimed, a
Are You More Attentive Than a Goldfish?
Time magazine is reporting that according to a recent Microsoft study, our average attention spans are now down to about eight seconds. This actually puts us as less attentive than goldfish, whose attention spans average about nine seconds. Time reports that Canadian researchers surveyed 2,000 participants and studied the brain activity of 112 others using
More Social Studies Quotes
I’m still working at the local high school while a social studies teacher gets his homelife together. I always like to post a different quote each day, tying into the lesson if possible. Here are some of my recent favorites. “The Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.” — Abba Eban “Never tell