Stories Short and Strange
17 short stories for general audiences ranging from the unusual to the unbelievable to the just plain strange.
My Eclipse Day
It seemed like a good idea at the time. Studying the map for the August 21 total solar eclipse, I realize I was only about 300 miles from the path of totality (where the moon’s shadow completely covers the sun), or about a half day’s drive. I’d never seen a total eclipse before, so I
A Solution For Senior Housing?
As a senior citizen, I’m always concerned about my long-term future. How much longer will I be able to live by myself in a large house? (It had better be a very long time because you won’t believe the stuff I’ve accumulated over the years.) This is why I was intrigued by a TV news
The Latest From Thomas Friedman
Thomas L. Friedman, author of The World is Flat, has a recent book with the unlikely title of Thank You For Being Late: An Optimist’s Guide to Thriving in the Age of Accelerations. The world is changing quickly, too quickly for many people. Friedman identifies three major change agents — Moore’s law (the increase in
Food You Can Wear
We’ve been hearing a lot about sustainability and recycling as a way to conserve resources. How far could we take this if we put our minds to it? Pretty far. One of the more novel ideas I’ve heard regarding recycling the byproducts of food production comes from designer Sacha Laurin. Her career began as a
Mountain Climbing 101
For some reason, I can’t import any of my photos into this article. Photos are on my Facebook page. Several weeks after I’d signed up for my Africa trip, the travel agency called me. “Would you like to climb Mt. Kilimanjaro?” I thought that sounded like a real adventure. At my age, this would
The Dangers of the Albinism Trait
It’s hard to be an optimist when you keep uncovering horror stories about the human race. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised by a species that once believed in witchcraft, but it still can be shocking. Recently while catching up on reading, I found an article entitled “The Perils of Pale” in the June 2017
How Do You Tie a New Country Together?
Think back to the early days of our country. We were a collection of 13 disparate colonies, each with a unique reason for being. We had just won our independence by throwing off an authoritarian king and now we were suspicious of a strong central government. How do you pull a country like that together?
The Amazing Maasai
In my last post, I mentioned traveling to Kenya as a kind of homage to all the great runners who have come from that region. Not only did I get to see some iconic wildlife up close and personal, but I supported girls’ education by participating in the Amazing Maasai Marathon (http://www.marathontours.com/races/amazing-maasai-marathon-333). The Maasai tribe
Thoughts on World Travel
I’ve just returned from an amazing trip to Kenya and Tanzania, which I will write about in the upcoming weeks. I describe this trip as amazing because it was both ambitious and exotic, visiting places most people never see. This is a shame because these people have proud cultures stretching back thousands of years, and
The Complicated Lives of Fireflies
I grew up on a farm in western Ohio, and every summer I can remember watching lightening bugs from my bedroom window. But like everything else in this world, it’s complicated. First, most people call them fireflies. According to an entry in the July 7, 2017 Smithsonian magazine’s VIP newsletter by Jason Bittel, they are