Simanaitis Says

On cars, old, new and future; science & technology; vintage airplanes, computer flight simulation of them; Sherlockiana; our English language; travel; and other stuff

BEECHCRAFT PREMIER I BUSINESS JET

IT HAS BEEN almost 15 years since I held the controls of a Beechcraft Premier I business jet, briefly at Flight Level 410 and also during our descent into Beech … Continue reading

March 7, 2021 · Leave a comment

RIP’S DREAM

RIP VAN WINKLE slept—and dreamt—from January 20, 2020, to January 20, 2021. When he awoke from this extended nap, he asked his daughter, “So, what’s new?”  “Dad,” she said, “you … Continue reading

March 6, 2021 · Leave a comment

FINNED SEISMOLOGISTS AID IN OCEANIC RESEARCH

THE FIN WHALE, Balaenotera physalus, grows to about 80 ft. in length, weighs up to 80 tons, lives more than 80 years, and chats with others of its species in … Continue reading

March 5, 2021 · Leave a comment

CELEBRATING MAGAZINES

STEVEN LOMAZOW, M.D., collects magazine, some 83,000 of them. And New York City’s Grolier Club has assembled an exhibition selected from his collection. Jennifer Schuessler writes “Are Magazines Dead? Not … Continue reading

March 4, 2021 · 1 Comment

LE SEX FAIBLE

A CENTURY BEFORE Danica Patrick and long before international rally driver Michèle Mouton and NASCAR/Indy driver Janet Guthrie, women were excelling in motorsports. In July 1975, R&T published a summary … Continue reading

March 3, 2021 · 1 Comment

BLAISE PASCAL—COUNTING ON THINGS

SEVENTEENTH-CENTURY MATHEMATICIAN Blaise Pascal was also a physicist, philosopher, theologian, and inventor, perhaps best known for co-founding the mathematical theory of probability and devising Pascal’s Triangle coefficients of the binomial … Continue reading

March 2, 2021 · 4 Comments

A BEAUTIFUL LOVE LETTER TO THE SIMPLE, SOULFUL FOODS OF JAPAN

MY TITLE HERE is taken from comments offered by American chef, restauranteur, and activist Alice Waters in describing Sonoko Sakai’s book Japanese Home Cooking: Simple Meals, Authentic Flavors.  Sakai says, … Continue reading

March 1, 2021 · 1 Comment

OBAMA’S MEMOIRS

I HAVEN’T READ Barack Obama’s A Promised Land, and considering the number of books already on my “to-read” stack, I’m not likely to attempt this 768-page challenge. On the other … Continue reading

February 28, 2021 · Leave a comment

ETYMOLOGY: VACCINE

MUCH ON OUR minds these days, the word “vaccine” has interesting etymology and important current usage. Here are tidbits gleaned from my usual Internet sleuthing. Dictionary Definition. Merriam-Webster says a … Continue reading

February 27, 2021 · Leave a comment

BARD STATS

WHEN WIFE DOTTIE was a kid, she and her friend Gracie Watts would perform plays for their parents. When she asked her dad which part he liked best, he’d invariably … Continue reading

February 26, 2021 · Leave a comment