|
What's new?
December 12, 2021: If you're new to this blog, click the next link for advice on Getting started. Entry #0269, Spelling Bee, is a tutorial on how to use a spreadsheet that I wrote to help you play the New York Times game "Spelling Bee". It will be of interest only to readers who play Spelling Bee, and who are familiar with, and can run, Microsoft Excel.
June 28, 2021: Entry #0268, A marriage tip, gives some advice on the occasion of reaching our 51st wedding anniversary.
December 3, 2020: Entry #0267, Thanksgiving 2020, describes how we celebrated Thanksgiving safely during the COVID-19 pandemic.
July 5, 2020: Entry #0266, Fiftieth (bis), describes how we celebrated the day of our anniversary. It turned out to be quite a joyous event.
June 28, 2020: Entry #0265, Fiftieth, was posted on our fiftieth wedding anniversary, celebrated under very different circumstances than we ever could have anticipated. I was surprised to find that it's been exactly one year since my previous entry was posted.
June 28, 2019: Entry #0264, Locura lingüística (in Spanish), discusses some curiosities of the Spanish language. It's a translation into Spanish of portions of my earlier entry Linguistic lunacy.
May 9, 2019: Entry #0263, One.MIT, describes the 'One.MIT' project I saw on a tour of the new MIT.nano building.
November 25, 2017: Entry #0262, The mathematics of coffee stirrers tells of a conversation between Professors Marvin Minsky and John McCarthy which casts some light on how mathematicians think.
June 14, 2017: Entry #0261, El relato de Leon Cogan, is the story of a 7-year-old Russian immigrant learning English. It's in Spanish, a translation of my 2010 entry Leon Cogan's story.
May 2, 2017: In entry #0260, English, U.K. vs. U.S., I discuss slang used in British television programs that I watch on PBS, words not used in the United States.
January 11, 2017: Entry #0259, 75, contains some thoughts on the occasion of my seventy-fifth birthday.
December 25, 2016: Entry #0258, O Christmas tree, explains how I keep my tree hydrated. As a bonus: the co-incidence of Christmas and Hanukkah this year, and "Tree Dazzler" Christmas lights.
July 28, 2016: Some of you techies might be interested in reading my entry #0257, Windows 10, in which I describe my experience upgrading my computer's operating system from Windows 7 to Windows 10.
June 26, 2016: In entry #0256, Great Britain to Little England?, I rewrote the words to the Gilbert & Sullivan song When Britain Really Ruled the Waves, as a comment on "brexit", the recent British vote to exit the European Union.
May 10, 2016: Entry #0255, The Man Card, is a comment on Donald Trump's only qualification in the 2016 Republican Presidential Primaries.
April 2, 2016: Entry #0254, Preferential voting, describes a better way of counting votes in contests with more than two candidates. Its use might have improved this year's Republican primary process, in which having multiple opponents rewarded Donald Trump.
March 23, 2016:Entry #0253, Google (bis), describes how I was finally able to identify my 'thingy', a strange object found alongside a road, that was shown and described in my earlier entry Google.
February 26, 2016: Entry #0252, Republicans Reject Jesus for the Supreme Court, explores a possible consequence of the Republican refusal to consider any Obama nominee to the Supreme Court.
February 19, 2016: Entry #0251, Hablando inglés, is the first blog entry I've ever written in Spanish. It contains advice for Spanish speakers on how to improve their pronunciation of English. A link at the top takes you to an English translation.
September 15, 2015: Entry #0250, Weird hail, shows some really odd hailstones that fell during a recent thunderstorm.
August 31, 2015: In entry #0249, Harvard Yard (bis), Elissa parks her Dar in Harvard Yard for the third consecutive year.
June 30, 2015: In entry #0248, Forty-five years, a 45th wedding anniversary gift from Margie is shown.
April 23, 2015: Entry #0247, Openly secular, publicly declares my atheism on the first annual Openly Secular Day.
September 27, 2014: Entry #0246, Darwin grows up, describes, with lots of photos, how my granddaughter Darwin is turning into a real little person.
September 11, 2014: In entry #0245, Blogging on, I announce that I'll no longer be posting a blog entry every week, and preview some entries still to come.
August 28, 2014: In entry #0244, Harvard Yard, we push Darwin around the Yard a second time, one year after the first.
August 21, 2014: Entry #0243, Elves, is about the hidden people of Iceland.
August 14, 2014: Entry #0242 introduces a new Reading recommendation page, which I hope will provide a useful guide to finding your way around this blog.
August 7, 2014: There was no blog entry last week because Margie and I were on vacation in Iceland. Entry #0241, Iceland, contains some thoughts about that country.
July 24, 2014: In entry #0240, The world according to Darwin, Darwin builds vocabulary, and makes sense of the world.
July 17, 2014: In entry #0239, Blue, white, and red, I dress up for our sixth Bastille Day dinner with French in Acton.
July 10, 2014: Entry #0238, Power failure (bis) reports on our second power outage, longer than the first.
July 3, 2014: In entry #0237, we celebrate Forty-four years of marriage.
June 26, 2014: Entry #0236, Doctor's office (bis), adds a few more tales from doctor's offices and waiting rooms.
June 19, 2014: Entry #0235, Wayland 375, describes the final day of the Town of Wayland's 375th anniversary celebration.
June 12, 2014: Entry #0234, Doctor's office, tells a few tales of events that took place in various doctor's offices.
June 5, 2014: Entry #0233, Tree work, documents the removal of three very large pine trees across the street from my house.
May 29, 2014: Entry #0232, Nature, shows some things I came across while walking near my house.
May 22, 2014: Entry #0231, The animals of Old Sudbury Road, describes animals both real and imaginary that we've seen driving along a local road.
May 15, 2014: Entry #0230, MIT hacks, describes a couple of "hacks" I perpetrated at MIT, as a student, and more recently.
May 8, 2014: Entry #0229, Inventions, is about my list of potentially patentable inventions, with an example.
April 29, 2014: In entry #0228, Power failure, we lose our electricity - NOT!
April 24, 2014: Entry #0227, Japanese knotweed, is about an invasive plant, and a role it played in my arrival at Kronos.
April 17, 2014: Entry #0226, Old rules, contains assorted driving-related advice from my past.
April 10, 2014: Entry #0225, Ice mysteries, discusses some strange behaviors of snow and ice that I've observed.
April 1, 2014: Entry #0224, Pastafarianism, reveals cosmic secrets encoded in Italian pasta.
March 27, 2014: Entry #0223, Gadgets (bis), describes a few additional gadgets I've built.
March 20, 2014: Entry #0222, Data-Mate (bis), describes the circumstances surrounding my first date with Margie, arranged by the computerized dating service Data-Mate in 1969.
March 13, 2014: In entry #0221, the early computer dating service Data-Mate introduces me to Margie.
March 6, 2014: Entry #0220 documents Darwin's entire First year, week by week.
February 27, 2014: Entry #0219 is posted on the day Darwin reaches One year of age.
February 20, 2014: Entry #0218 is about Margie, on the occasion of her 70th birthday.
February 13, 2014: In entry #0217, I describe our use of the Fodor's Forums to help plan our vacation travel.
February 6, 2014: Entry #0216 discusses Camp Robinson Crusoe, and why it was so important to me.
January 30, 2014: Entry #0215, MIT scenes, tells of a minor hack I once pulled off, and shows some interesting things that can be seen on the MIT campus.
January 23, 2014: Entry #0214 discusses some simple Divisibility tricks, and my participation in my high school's math team.
January 16, 2014: Entry #0213, Hair, shows some of the many hairstyles of Darwin.
January 9, 2014: Entry #0212 contains some thoughts as I turn 72 (and my blog turns 4).
January 2, 2014: Entry #0211 describes a trip we took to celebrate Christmas 2013. And oh, Happy New Year!!
December 19, 2013: Entry #0210 explains why we celebrate Christmas.
December 12, 2013: Entry #0209 is about my great-grandfather Philip, the first Krakauer of our family to arrive in the United States.
December 5, 2013: Entry #0208 celebrates baby Darwin's First Thanksgiving.
November 27, 2013: Entry #0207, Nine months, celebrates baby Darwin's nine-month birthday.
November 21, 2013: Entry #0206, Radio Workshop, describes a high school course I took in the fifties, and a visit to WBZ Radio in 2013.
November 14, 2013: Entry #0205 continues last week's visit to Boston's WBZ-TV studios, with a description of the WBZ control room.
November 7, 2013: Entry #0204 describes a visit to Boston's WBZ-TV studios (part 1 of 2).
October 31, 2013: In entry #0203 I discuss some of the connections I've made due to Having a website.
October 24, 2013: In entry #0202, Applause, baby Darwin continues to develop (and roots for the Boston Red Sox).
October 17, 2013: Entry #0201, Backup, documents the installation of our new generator.
October 10, 2013: Entry #0200, Gas (ter), shows off our new gas-fired boiler and hot water heater.
October 3, 2013: Entry #0199, Demo day, documents the demolition and removal of our old furnace and hot water heater.
September 26, 2013: In entry #0198, Gas (bis), I documented our old furnace and water heater before they were demolished.
September 19, 2013: In entry #0197, Milestones, baby Darwin undergoes rapid change.
September 12, 2013: Entry #0196, Funny stuff, is a collection of pictures of amusing things I've come across recently.
September 5, 2013: In entry #0195, Gas, we have a natural gas line brought to our house.
August 29, 2013: In entry #0194, Solid food, Darwin adds variety to her diet.
August 22, 2013: Entry #0193, American Express, describes trying to replace some lost American Express traveler's checks on Cape Cod, back in the seventies.
August 8, 2013: In entry #0192, Accents, I explain how to type accented characters.
August 1, 2013: In entry #0191, Not so fast, Sherlock, I discuss another disagreement I have with Sherlock Holmes.
July 25, 2013: Entry #0190, Troubleshooting (bis), is about fixing an intermittent problem.
July 18, 2013: Entry #0189, The moon, explains why the appearance of the moon doesn't change as it crosses the sky.
July 11, 2013: Entry #0188, Ixodes scapularis, is about the deer tick.
July 4, 2013: Entry #0187, Forty-three years, describes a celebratory dinner on our 43rd wedding anniversary.
June 27, 2013: Entry #0186, Helium, discusses a couple of things I've worried about.
June 20, 2013: Entry #0185, Fifty years (ter), has still more on my reunion.
June 13, 2013: Entry #0184, Fifty years (bis), has more on my fiftieth college reunion.
June 6, 2013: Tomorrow will be precisely Fifty years since I graduated from MIT. Entry #0183 celebrates my fiftieth college reunion, in progress.
May 30, 2013: Entry #0182 continues my discussion of Science (bis). Is it the only road to truth?
May 23, 2013: Entry #0181 addresses the question, what is Science?
May 16, 2013: Entry #0180 tells some stories about Raccoons.
May 9, 2013: In entry #0179, Zürich, I present a technical paper in Zürich, Switzerland.
May 2, 2013: Entry #0178, Japanese, describes some of my experiences with the Japanese language.
April 25, 2013: Entry #0177, Photographed world, talks about our ubiquitous cameras, in the context of the horrific Boston Marathon bombings here in the Boston area ten days ago.
April 18, 2013: Entry #0176, Night race, describes an overnight sailboat race in Cape Cod Bay.
April 11, 2013: Entry #0175, Gaining weight overnight, asks if it's possible to gain weight while sleeping.
April 4, 2013: Entry #0174, Snow shovels, discusses the variety of snow shovels needed for a New England winter.
March 28, 2013: Entry #0173, Changes, celebrates my granddaughter Dar's one-month birthday.
March 21, 2013: Entry #0172, Computers on the road, discusses the evolution of the computers I carry when I travel, and in particular the use of my Samsung Galaxy S III smart phone for that purpose.
March 14, 2013: Here's a mathematical entry for "Pi day" (3/14): entry #0171, How many squares?, answers a puzzle that's been floating around the Internet and Facebook.
March 7, 2013: Entry #0170, Blogging, discusses different ways to host a blog, with a link to Sara's blog entry on baby Darwin.
February 28, 2013: I've become a first time grandfather! Entry #0169, Darwin, has pictures.
February 21, 2013: Entry #0168, The switch that worked once, solves the mystery of a switch that failed on its second use.
February 14, 2013: Entry #0167, The blizzard of 2013, documents our experiences during last weekend's winter storm.
February 7, 2013: Entry #0166, What's wrong with this picture?, asks if you can find a problem in each of three images.
January 31, 2013: Entry #0165, Life in the 'burbs, shows the hidden world revealed by a light dusting of snow.
January 24, 2013: Entry #0164, Blue skies, tells how I changed the color of the sky.
January 17, 2013: Entry #0163, Heathkit, describes the building of my first personal computer, an IBM PC clone.
January 10, 2013: Entry #0162, 71, contains thoughts on turning 71, and the third anniversary of my blog.
January 3, 2013: Entry #0161, Connections (bis), discusses printed circuit boards, continuing my brief presentation of developments in electronic interconnection during my lifetime.
December 27, 2012: Entry #0160, Connections, discusses soldering. It's the first of two entries about how connections in electronic circuitry have evolved during my lifetime.
December 20, 2012: Entry #0159, Bad design, discusses a couple of faucet designs that ought to be flushed. Bonus: a neat Italian toilet!
12/12/12: Entry #0158, 12/12/12, uses the occasion of 12/12/12 to talk a bit about numerical patterns.
December 6, 2012: Entry #0157, Personal computers, describes a bit of the path from vacuum tube mainframes to desktop personal computers.
November 29, 2012: Entry #0156, The pond, shows the building of a pond in western Massachusetts, and describes simple measurements we made to estimate how long it would take to fill.
November 21, 2012: Entry #0155, The Lecture Series Committee, shows off my collection of silkscreened posters advertising films shown at MIT in 1962.
November 15, 2012: Entry #0154, Classrooms Abroad, contains more stories about my first trip to France.
November 8, 2012: Entry #0153, Linguistic gender, talks about grammatical gender in foreign languages.
November 1, 2012: Entry #0152, Hurricane, contains some thoughts following our very recent experience with Hurricane Sandy.
October 25, 2012: Entry #0151, La globista de Akumal, describes a balloon-twisting excursion during a family trip to Mexico.
October 18, 2012: Entry #0150, The Italians, is the result of observations made on some of our trips to Italy.
September 20, 2012: Entry #0149, Spatial relations, shows a type of project I often constructed as a child, and a recent project using the same skills.
September 13, 2012: Entry #0148 presents Cyrano composes a ballade, an English paper I submitted in my Senior year of high school.
September 6, 2012: Entry #0147 is about The good old days (or were they?).
August 30, 2012: In entry #0146, I talk about learning Spanish. There's also a link to a supplement on spoken stress vs. written accent in that language.
August 23, 2012: In entry #0145, I describe my education in Physics, from childhood through MIT.
August 16, 2012: In entry #0144, I finally Upgrade to a new "smart" phone.
August 9, 2012: In entry #0143, The poison apple (bis), I re-wrote one of my earliest blog entries to be more descriptive, as a writing exercise. Better? Worse?
August 2, 2012: Entry #0142, Troubleshooting, describes some of my early diagnostic experiences.
July 26, 2012: Entry #0141, Bus stop, shows where our children waited for the school bus years ago.
July 19, 2012: Want to be an idiot savant? Entry #0140, Day of the week, teaches you how to compute the day of the week in your head, given a calendar date.
July 12, 2012: Entry #0139, Le jour de gloire, is about the French national anthem, La Marseillaise.
July 5, 2012: In entry #0138, Poison ivy comes a creeping.
June 28, 2012: Today's entry, #0137, falls on my wedding anniversary. I've been married for Forty-two years.
June 21, 2012: In entry #0136, Eleven, I notice an odd property of my morning weigh-ins.
June 14, 2012: Entry #0135, Driving in France, contains some tips for American drivers in France.
June 7, 2012: Entry #0134, Piles, is about all my stuff.
May 31, 2012: Entry #0133, Sturbridge fields forever, recounts some events that took place on the playing fields of Camp Robinson Crusoe.
May 24, 2012: Entry #0132 contains assorted stories from my college days about students suffering from Sleep deprivation.
May 17, 2012: Entry #0131 is about my father's Bow ties.
May 10, 2012: Entry #0130, Gadgets, is about various things I've built.
May 3, 2012: Entry #0129, Things I worry about, shows a wonderful gift I received from my daughter Sara many years ago.
April 26, 2012: Entry #0128, Oldthink, discusses changes in our life and language as technology marches on.
April 19, 2012: Entry #0127, Old, describes an annual physical exam that made me feel old.
April 12, 2012: Entry #0126, Google, talks about how the Internet and Internet search engines have changed our lives.
April 5, 2012: Entry #0125, Amateur subway riding, describes an interesting project I participated in while a graduate student at MIT.
March 29, 2012: Entry #0124, Larry Black, tells the story of how I came to be an electrical engineer.
March 22, 2012: Entry #0123, Schematics, is about diagrammatic representations, like maps and circuit diagrams.
March 15, 2012: Entry #0122, Voting, is about the technology for voting in a large meeting, and how it's changed over the years.
March 8, 2012: Entry #0121, Y2K speech (part 2), contains the conclusion of the year 2000 speech started in the previous entry.
March 1, 2012: Entry #0120, Y2K speech (part 1), contains the beginning of a humorous 1999 speech I gave on the upcoming arrival of the Year 2000.
February 23, 2012: Entry #0119, Y2K (bis), continues my recollections of our preparations for the arrival of the year 2000.
February 16, 2012: Entry #0118, Y2K, discusses preparing for the arrival of the year 2000.
February 9, 2012: Entry #0117, Chester (ter), is the third and final entry on our first family dog.
February 2, 2012: Entry #0116, The Masons, explains how I came to be a "Free and Accepted Mason".
January 26, 2012: Entry #0115, Chester (bis), is the second of three entries on our first family dog, a Tibetan Terrier named Chester.
January 19, 2012: Entry #0114, called Sara's birthday gift, is a "guest entry", written by my daughter Sara in honor of my 70th birthday.
January 11, 2012: Entry #0113, entitled 70, is being posted on my 70th birthday, which is also the second anniversary of my blog.
I've altered my pages to display better on browsers other than Internet Explorer, such as Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox (for you techies: I removed the now deprecated <basefont> tag, recognized only by Explorer).
January 5, 2012: Entry #0112, Chester, is the first of three entries on our first family dog, a Tibetan Terrier named Chester.
December 29, 2011: Entry #0111, Word processors, describes an interesting 1963 study on human factors in word processing, for which I did some of the programming.
December 22, 2011: My great-grandfather Philip Krakauer and the next three generations of his descendents have been granted 73 United States patents, as described in entry #0110, Patents. Only three of them are mine.
December 15, 2011: Entry #0109, Kristin Espinasse, describes a visit in France to my "blogging idol".
December 8, 2011: Entry #0108, Tracks, discusses some tracks I found in the snow.
December 1, 2011: Entry #0107, The chipmunk, recounts the story of an incident that occurred when I was a summer camp counselor-in-training.
November 23, 2011: Entry #0106, Frequent kickbacks, discusses "frequent flyer" programs and corporate ethics policies.
November 17, 2011: Entry #0105 contains some thoughts on Algorithms (with cartoons).
November 10, 2011: Entry #0104, Yiddish, contains some stories relating to the Yiddish language.
November 3, 2011: Entry #0103, Krakauer, discusses the origin of my family name (and how to pronounce it).
October 27, 2011: Entry #0102, Vocabulary, presents my vocabulary cards from the sixth grade, illustrated by cartoons.
October 20, 2011: Entry #0101, Dan and Elissa, talks about interests shared by my father and a daughter.
This blog has been included in a list of the "50 Best Memoir Blogs" put together by the site "AdultEducationCourse.org". Scroll down on this page and look in the left-hand column to see their "Best Blog Badge".
October 13, 2011: This blog was started in January of 2010, and this is entry number one hundred! Entry #0100, Recalculating!, talks about GPS units in general, our own Garmin GPS, and in particular its use in Europe.
October 6, 2011: Entry #0099, The French, gives some impressions from a recent trip to France.
September 29, 2011: Entry #0098 describes The Costco effect: Buying more than you want because it's cheaper than buying only what you need.
September 8, 2011: Entry #0097, Live free and die, is an essay on seatbelts.
September 1, 2011: Entry #0096, Wrestling for Baker House, describes my brief athletic career at MIT.
August 25, 2011: Is it good to have a "bias for action"? How much should we think about a problem before acting? See Entry #0095, Just do it.
August 18, 2011: Entry #0094 discusses some aspects of "Gender", both human and linguistic.
August 11, 2011: Entry #0093 is in memory of Marthe Mulvaney.
August 4, 2011: Entry #0092 contains some stories about our relationship to Food.
July 28, 2011: Entry #0091 is a tribute to the late great analog designer Bob Pease.
July 21, 2011: Entry #0090, Being smart discusses what being of above average intelligence has meant to me.
July 14, 2011: The Fourteenth of July commemorates the taking of the Bastille prison, the start of the French Revolution. So it's appropriate that Entry #0089, Allons enfants de la patrie ..., describes a Bastille Day celebration we took part in on our honeymoon at the Club Med in Martinique in 1970 (with lots of pictures).
July 7, 2011: Entry #0088, The English sparrow, contains a few stories about birds. In the first, we harass a bird, but it triumphs in the end. In the second, an early bird harasses a New York reporter. And in the third, we meet Brad Blodgett, and learn a bit about a particular bird on Cape Cod.
June 30, 2011: Entry #0087, Copies, recalls that it was once not that easy to make copies of a document. This is followed by a discussion of digital copying.
June 23, 2011: Entry #0086, Dan and the moon, shows how, using the moon, my father taught me how to think.
June 16, 2011: Entry #0085, Hackers, has a few stories from MIT's Artificial Intelligence Lab, in the sixties. This makes three rather technological entries in a row, so I'll try for something else next week.
Having received comments from Richard Greenblatt, I've also updated last week's entry, Moby Memory, for those who might be interested in more detail (and greater accuracy).
June 9, 2011: Entry #0084, Moby Memory, is about a Fabri-Tek "core" memory of 256K 36-bit "words", purchased in the sixties by MIT's Artificial Intelligence group. This is a rather technological entry, so it may not be for everyone.
June 2, 2011: Entry #0083, Nerd pride, describes some experiences with early computer hackers.
May 26, 2011: Entry #0082, Nils Frederiksen, remembers Nils and Nancy Frederiksen (with incidents in a calculus class at MIT, and a doctor's office in Denmark).
May 19, 2011: Entry #0081, Le stage, describes a summer job in France in 1964.
May 12, 2011: In Entry #0080, Grandpa's first flight, my grandfather Abe gets on an airplane.
May 5, 2011: ¡ Feliz cinco de mayo ! Entry #0079, entitled Television, describes the television technology of my youth.
April 28, 2011: Entry #0078, entitled Air Chance, is about the return flight from our honeymoon in Martinique.
April 21, 2011: Entry #0077, entitled Abe, is about my paternal grandfather Abraham Krakauer.
April 14, 2011: In entry #0076, we have fun reinterpreting English noun phrases.
Based on recently obtained information, I've also added a short footnote (Note 2) to entry #0039, Ask Larry.
April 7, 2011: Entry #0075, Listening, tells how Margie draws people out.
March 31, 2011: Entry #0074, Toothache tells about a Fourth of July toothache I once had.
I've also added a bit to my earlier entry about Rats: some footnotes, and a sketch by Natalia Rybczynski. Natalia, with my daughter Elissa, organized the private bi-annual Duke rodentfest, which included a Rodent Olympics.
March 24, 2011: Entry #0073, Badges contains a few stories loosely related to corporate identification badges.
March 17, 2011: I hope everyone had a pleasant and sober St. Patrick's Day. Entry #0072, The mushroom, tells the story of an experience Margie and I had with a wild mushroom.
March 10, 2011: Entry #0071, Telephones (bis), continues the history of telephones started last week. I also added a few footnotes and a little bit of new text to last week's entry (see link below).
March 3, 2011: Entry #0070 is a history of technology entry on Telephones. Hey kids, know why we say "dial" a telephone?
February 24, 2011: In Entry #0069, MIT people, I tell of some of the fascinating people I crossed paths with in my eleven years at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
February 17, 2011: Entry #0068, The gambler, tells about my MIT course on Statistical Decision Theory, and some of the lessons I learned from it.
I've also updated Entry #0061, Rats, to add a couple of cellphone pictures of a hairless rat that Elissa sent me (if you've already read it, scroll to the bottom).
February 10, 2011: Entry #0067, Eigenstories, talks about how stories have a tendency to get embellished over many retellings.
February 3, 2011: Entry #0066 is a bit more technical than most, but if you can at least skim the first part, I hope you'll find it interesting. It discusses the games Chess and nim, and by extension other finite, deterministic games. It starts with a question whose answer is easily computable in a finite amount of time, but which will probably never be known.
January 27, 2011: Why does English have so many words? Entry #0065 discusses one of the reasons, beginning with the example of Naked and nude.
January 20, 2011: Entry #0064, What's eating us?, discusses various parasites we've had the misfortune to become acquainted with.
January 11, 2011: This entry falls on my 69th birthday, and the first anniversary of my "Memoirs and Musings" blog. Thus entry #0063 discusses the various units we use to
represent Time, and also "interesting" numbers, such as today's date, 1/11/11.
January 6, 2011: I hope everyone emerged safe and sound from a great New Year's Eve celebration, and welcome to 2011. In entry #0062, we go from "Rats" to cats,
in The cat who came in from the cold.
December 29, 2010: Entry #0061 is about my daughter Elissa's pet Rats.
December 23, 2010: Entry #0060 has some stories from my first start-up
company, Micronetic Systems. And since it's December 23rd, let me wish everyone a very merry Christmas.
December 16, 2010: Entry #0059 has some stories about my adopted
home, Boston (two of them relate to snow, which may be coming this Sunday).
Having received permission from the The MetroWest Daily News, I've now posted the old Herbert L. Kahn
column He didn't appreciate the solace, which you may enjoy. I've linked to it from my entry of two weeks ago, entry
#0057, In loco parentis.
December 9, 2010: Entry #0058, Linguistic lunacy, discusses some of the odd quirks of English and Spanish.
December 2, 2010: Entry #0057, In loco parentis, contains some comments on dating in the sixties, when I was a student at MIT.
November 24, 2010: In entry #0056, The house of turkey death, you'll find a couple of turkey-related stories for Thanksgiving. Because tomorrow is Thanksgiving, I'm posting this entry a day earlier than usual. I hope you have (or had, depending on when you're reading this) a happy Thanksgiving celebration.
November 18, 2010: Entry #0055, Chess stories, contains a couple of tales of Richard Greenblatt's Mac Hack VI chess program, and some related stories.
I've also made a slight addition to Entry #0034,
Biscotti, to discuss the word "butterfly" in various languages, and to add a link to Frank Model's beautiful butterfly pictures.
November 11, 2010: Entry #0054, Amateur radio, tells the story of my history in amateur ("ham") radio.
November 4, 2010: Sara's always on the move - see entry #0053, Busy, busy.
October 28, 2010: If you have children, I hope that entry #0052, Magic, helps you remember a time when your children still thought you were magical.
October 21, 2010: Entry
#0051, Personalities, discusses the differing personalities a company needs, illustrated by a Kronos troubleshooting story.
October 14, 2010: By the principle of the tyranny of round numbers, entry #0050 is a blog milestone, my fiftieth entry! Called Disable interrupts, it discusses interrupts for both people and computers, and algorithms for taking pills.
October 7, 2010: Entry #0049, Le Cercle Français, describes how I was introduced to my conversational French discussion group about thirty years ago. It includes an interesting event that occurred in Mme. Brynjolfsson's conversational French course.
September 30, 2010: Entry #0048, The giant fork, is a collection of remembrances loosely related to sleep.
September 23, 2010: Entry #0047, Tyranny of the clock, is subtitled, "The pain in Spain is mainly in the brain." It's about eating in Spain, and how our modern dependence on the clock can limit our thinking.
September 2, 2010: A story about trying to track our children's flights can be found in entry #0046, Roots and wings.
August 26, 2010: Even if you're non-technical, see if you can get through
entry #0045, Bits. It will tell you what "one bit of memory" is, and how computers represent these bits physically, explained by way of the "Double Bed Dual-Control Electric Blanket Effect".
August 19, 2010: Entry #0044, Man v. Machine, contains a couple of stories of our ongoing battle with our own creations.
August 12, 2010: In entry #0043, Leon Cogan's story, a Russian Jewish émigré helps his daughter learn English.
August 5, 2010: Entry #0042, History of Kronos, part 2, presents the second part of my humorous 1997 speech (see below for part 1).
July 29, 2010: Entry #0041, History of Kronos, part 1, presents a humorous 1997 speech I gave to about 800 people at a Sales and Service conference in Chicago. It also explains exactly how, in the course of that speech, I set fire to a timecard. See just above for part 2.
July 22, 2010: Getting back to chess, the story of some of the tournament games played by Richard Greenblatt's chess program is told in entry #0040, Mac Hack VI competes.
July 15, 2010: This week reveals my first guest entry, written by my sister Alice. It's followed by some comments of my own. See entry #0039, Ask Larry. I hope you all had a great 14th of July yesterday (the French national holiday, celebrating the storming of the Bastille prison). Allons enfants de la patrie ...
July 8, 2010: Leaving my recent techie theme, I discuss the development of my childhood brain, in entry #0038, My brain on Ovaltine. Also a bit about radio in my youth.
July 1, 2010: Entry #0037, Computer chess via ham radio, describes a chess game played between two computers via amateur radio, for which I was the radio operator on the MIT side.
June 24, 2010: I think I was the first person in the world to ever teach a computer programming course at a summer camp, as described in
entry #0036, Computer camp.
June 17, 2010: Entry #0035, Biscotti (bis), discusses how Americans misuse and mispronounce Italian words. For those who really want all the details, it closes with the exact rules for pronouncing G, C, and SC in Italian.
June 10, 2010: Entry #0034, Biscotti, discusses some word origins, and connections between English and various foreign languages. It gives some insight into my fascination with foreign language study.
June 3, 2010: Entry #0033 is about My moustache, including why and how I shaved it off after over 35 years.
May 27, 2010: Entry #0032 features The Ayache formula, which is all about getting to the Place Clemenceau in the shortest time (but curse the dreaded "patisserie effect").
May 21, 2010: Gak! I'm a day late! For a story in which the two Ph.D.s at Micronetic Systems argue over the testing of a laser, see
#0031, Madhu and the death ray.
May 13, 2010: Can I really have enough stories about horseradish for an entry in my memoirs? Apparently so. See #0030, Horseradish.
May 6, 2010: Entry #0028, Sailing, contains a few sailing and windsurfing stories. #0029, Windsurfing for sailors, discusses learning to windsurf. As the title indicates, it's probably of interest only to people who are interested in windsurfing and already know how to sail. Thus I'm including it as an "extra" along with the sailing stories.
April 29, 2010: Entry #0026, Herr Bon, contains some memories of Primus Benedikt Bon, a professor of German at MIT in the sixties. It's followed by another entry that you'll want to skip, unless you're really into German grammar. It's entry #0027, German article and adjectival inflections.
April 22, 2010: Back to Great Neck North High School, this week's entry, #0025, is about studying French with Mr. Canfield.
April 15, 2010: U.S. citizens, I hope you've gotten your taxes in! This week's entry, #0024, is about my high school physics course, taught by Mr. Lusch.
April 8, 2010: This week's entry is #0022, Remembrance of things breast. And as a bonus, this week only, a free set of Ginsu knives a second entry, #0023, which answers the burning
question, Why do women have two breasts?.
April 1, 2010: Some of the memorable things my kids said as children are recalled in #0021, Kids say the darndest things.
March 25, 2010: For a story about French formality, on my first trip to France in 1961, see #0020, Monsieur L'Oiseau.
March 18, 2010: My battle with Burger King over the Massachusetts meals tax.
See #0019 Have it your way.
March 11, 2010: A romantic interlude in Mont-Tremblant National Park. See #0018 Mont-Tremblant.
March 4, 2010: Sometimes, words in one language are vulgar in another. See #0017 Western Ass.
February 26, 2010: My sister Phyllis once discovered a wonderful word that can get me to shut up! See #0016 Lobster. Sorry this entry is a bit late. We lost electricity for a few hours last evening, due to a rainstorm with high winds.
February 18, 2010: We're back from 12 wonderful days in Costa Rica (motto: "Still more monkeys than people"), where I was far away from my computer. Thus I can now
post #0015 "Sex in the Woods", about an event that transpired my first summer of sleepaway camp. It also introduces Camp Robinson Crusoe, which was important in my life, and about which there will eventually be other entries.
"Still more monkeys than people" is not actually the motto of Costa Rica, but was rather coined as a description of Manuel Antonio National Park by
the Hotel Costa Verde.
February 3, 2010: I won't be able to add an entry next week, so I'm posting two this week (a day early). These are #0013 "Frau Pan", about studying German at MIT, and #0014 "Due diligence", about investing in Kronos. Back again Thursday evening, February 18.
January 28, 2010: Added #0012 "Véronique", about my arrival at the house of my host family on my first trip to France in 1961.
January 21, 2010: Added #0011 "Harold", about my sister Alice's blue and gold macaw.
January 15, 2010: I added #0009 "Sehr gut", a story about my first adventure with German. Also #0010 "L'Accent tonique", some musings on the difficulties of hearing and speaking French, probably only of interest to those who speak or are studying French.
January 11, 2010: This blog was introduced on my 68th birthday, with eight entries to get you started. One or more new entries will be posted by the morning of every Friday. The initial eight entries are:
#0001, Introduction: What are these pages?
#0002, Who am I?
#0003, Why use the HTML and JPG file formats?
#0004, How I write
#0005, Coming to Kronos
#0006, The poison apple
#0007, Miss Crouch
#0008, I resign
|
