ODD BEDFELLOWS: NUCLEAR SCIENCE AND IRAN
POLICY AIMED at reducing the world’s nuclear weapons has led to odd international liaisons. In particular, the U.S. Department of Energy is buying 32 tons of heavy water, D2O, from … Continue reading
AND THEN HOLMES SAID…. OR DID HE?
THERE ARE lots of memorable utterances of Sherlock Holmes, and a goodly number of other ones attributed to this world’s greatest consulting detective—but incorrectly. Here’s a sampling from each category. … Continue reading
THE ULBRICHT CAPER
FROM TIME to time, stories on the electronic currency Bitcoin appear in the media. On May 2, 2016, for example, BBC News reported that “Australian Craig Wright Claims to be Bitcoin … Continue reading
PORTSMOUTH AEROCAR, PART 2
THE BEAUTY OF a good hobby is never knowing where it might lead. And so it is with my GMax/Microsoft Flight Simulator hobby and the Portsmouth Aerocar. Yesterday I offered a … Continue reading
PORTSMOUTH AEROCAR, PART 1
THIS IS a tale of post-World War II aviation optimism, the independence of India and, seven decades later, serendipity of the name Portsmouth in researching my GMax/Flight Simulator hobby. This … Continue reading
CRETORS POPCORN AND PEANUT WAGONS
LAST SATURDAY, I ate popcorn during the Metropolitan Opera’s HD presentation of Strauss’s searing Elektra. What’s more, the popcorn came from a theater concession directly related to this fetching bit … Continue reading
IT USTA BE SAID…
COLLOQUIALISMS ARE here today and gone tomorrow. But like this temporal analysis, some remain. A little research and some thinking revealed several gems of both categories, which follow in no … Continue reading
ON GRAVITY CLOCKS
THE TERM “gravity clock” suggests sci-fi. In fact, though, it can be quite the traditional opposite. I learned about gravity clocks through a friend gifting me with the RM /Sotheby’s auction … Continue reading
THE NEAR FUTURE: LET’S GET REAL
MEDIA ARE filled with predictions of a personal-mobility future. It’s “Soon we’ll commute by helicopter!” all over again, and in as few as four more years. Let’s get real. Despite … Continue reading
FRANCE FOR THE MOTORIST, 1927
CHARLES L. FREESTON legitimately appended F.R.G.S. to his name. Indeed, he was a Fellow of the Royal Geographical Society, founded in 1830 for the advancement of geographical sciences. In the … Continue reading
Simanaitis Says 