The Wrack

Perfectly reliable and yet completely unknowable, pi is one of those great Absolute Truths that seem to only exist in mathematics. Its one of only a few beautiful round pearls buried in the sands of space and time. How can you not love it, even envy it a little?

The following was published in the Biddeford-Saco?Journal Tribune Sunday edition, 2/22/2015.

I learned a new word this year. Subnivean, from the Latin for under (sub) and snow (nives). Its the zone within and underneath the snowpack. Its where weve all been living lately.

The following was published in the Biddeford-Saco?Journal Tribune Sunday edition, 2/8/2015.

In America, enshrined in our First Amendment, we have a right to voicing our own opinions. But ever since the Charlie Hebdo attacks in France, Ive been thinking about whether free speech does have limits. If what I say ends up hurting others, or even myself, I may have a right to say it& but should I?

The following was published in the Biddeford-Saco?Journal Tribune Sunday edition, 12/28/2014.

I sat in the tire shop the day before Christmas, waiting for the technician to switch my summer tires for winter ones, and scrutinized my fingers. Id recently read an article about new biological research that pointed to a possible explanation for one of the great mysteries that has bedeviled mankind for millennia: why DO our fingers get wrinkly in the bath?

The following was published in the Biddeford-Saco?Journal Tribune Sunday edition, 12/7/2014.

My family likes to takes walks, particularly in the fall and winter. Given the calories were consuming lately, and the long nights given over to reading and TV, were trying to grab every opportunity we can to stretch our legs and lungs outside.

While golf may be a great way to spoil a long walk, as the saying goes, fortunately theres nothing like the scientific method to enhance a little wander through the woods. Proposing, testing, and analyzing hypotheses prevents hypothermia by keeping the brain warm, I tell my wife and kids. They roll their eyes& but then we find something to examine.

The following was published in the Biddeford-Saco?Journal Tribune Sunday edition, 11/23/2014.

The most important thing I can say about this years midterm election is simply: thank you for voting.

Maine had the highest voter turnout in the entire 50 states, with 59.3% of us going to the polls, well above the national average of 36%. If it was the gu-bear-natorial nature of our election, so be it: each vote tallied was an expression of individual preference. Some races were decided by single digits; others, by lopsided majorities. In each race, and on each ballot question, we now know what a majority of our fellow Mainers decisively think. Thats valuable information and worth thinking about.

The following was published in the Biddeford-Saco?Journal Tribune Sunday edition, 11/2/2014.

From reports, it sounds like this years midterm election is a doozy, money-wise: across the country, campaigns are spending record sums marketing their candidates and causes.? So I read, anyway: I do not watch broadcast TV, I have an ad blocker on my computer, and I only listen to satellite radio and MPBN. Voluntarily [and gratefully] deaf to the din from most of the marketing wars, I rarely hear about the latest advances in breakfast cereal, let alone the biannual election season onslaught.

About the only political advertising I do see are ads in newspapers (bless you, candidates, for feeding our starving print publishers), and outdoor campaign signs.

Three hundred and fifty million years ago, the supercontinent Pangaea floated where you sit today. It was a warm, wet world, bathed in oxygen and soupy seas. The Carboniferous period was a time from which we get a lot of the fossil fuels we now use to power our society.

Figure 1: A chart of the scientific consensus on climate change (97% of scientists agree that humans are driving global warming), and how much attention the minority opinion seems to receive in the media. Or is it a graph of the amount of America's wealth controlled by the top 3% (54.5%), vs. the bottom 97%?

?

The following was published in the Biddeford-Saco?Journal Tribune Sunday edition, 10/5/2014.

Two weeks ago, my family and I were perched on the steps of the grand fountain in Columbus Circle, Manhattan, watching 300,000 people march past. They sang, they shouted, and they carried thousands of messages, all communicating one thing: world leaders, its time to do something about climate change. A week of action followed. Further protests spread around the world, corporations declared carbon reduction goals, and even presidents and prime ministers frankly spoke of addressing the need to revise a framework for negotiation.

Thats some progress, anyway.

The following was published in the Biddeford-Saco?Journal Tribune Sunday edition, 9/21/2014.

With a too-short summer and the back-to-school fracas, anyone would be pardoned for missing the official Congressional resolution naming this coming week National Estuaries Week, the annual celebration of the places where rivers meet the sea.

Before you get too excited, please understand that the resolution is merely pending, and that estuaries dont get the whole month. According to Congress, the entire 30 days of September have, in recent years, been reserved for Gospel Music Heritage, Bourbon Heritage, Prostate Cancer Awareness, Childhood Obesity, Honey, and even Self-Awareness. (And you thought our legislators didnt do anything  shame on you.)

Resolved or not, 1/52nd of a year certainly seems like a worthy amount of time to devote to estuaries, those humble places of mud and marsh that do so much.