One of my favorite streaming channels is Japan’s NHK World, broadcast in English. It isn’t very pleasing when it has programs about other countries — I go there to learn about Japan — but it often has satisfying, even soothing shows about that country’s tremendous beauty and rich culture.
Last week in a closed hearing of a congressional committee looking at the pandemic and governments’ handling of it, the former head of the National Institutes of Health, Dr. Francis Collins, admitted that much of what his agency and others told the country was just pulled out of thin air (literally), and that his agency and others under his control tried to quash any talk of the likely origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
I’ve embarked on an important research project to further humanity’s understanding of the world. A project to delve deep into one of life’s most important questions. One that furthers the far reaches of science. One that helps to better understand… the chocolate chip cookie.
I look at it every year and every year it looks a little different from how it looked the year before.
Many is the time I’ve cooked up a high-concept proposal to get an editor to let me do something I wanted to do anyway. I would not accuse Amy Gibas of this, but something in me kind of hopes that her masters degree research proposal had something to do with a desire to have fun with balloons. About which she was nothing if not passionate.
If you’re less than 50 years old, your entire life has taken place in the time since a human being walked on the moon. This to me is a scandal. It is our nature to explore and from new places explore further, not to touch a new place then scurry home. It isn’t entirely unprecedented — probably the most famous example is when the Vikings sailed to Newfoundland, discovered that their watches were off by half an hour, and retreated. It should be noted that there aren’t any Vikings now, though it is believed that their origin, Norway, still exists.
Thirteen years ago, before it was deliberately changed to “Doctor Who Cares?” there was a special one-shot episode of “Doctor Who,” entitled “Planet of the Dead.” It was good, as any show with David Tennant in the lead role tends to be. Michelle Ryan was excellent as Lady Christina de Souza, and I think I was not alone in hoping she was destined to become the Doctor’s companion.