Musings

A pyrrhic victory is not worth winning because the winner loses so much to achieve it. The term comes from the Greek general Pyrrhus who defeated the Romans at the Battle of Asculum in 279 BC but lost so many troops that he couldn’t defeat Rome itself. This is where we get the term “winning…

When I start my car (Elsa) a warning appears on the touchscreen display: “Do not let the system distract you from the traffic conditions” Apparently the Germans do not use contractions. It is interesting to me how we can see or hear something many times without thinking about it, and then our particular circumstances and…

I did not see a little bear while I was in the Teton National Park last week. However, I was warned that I might. A young black bear had been showing up around the home where I was staying in the days prior to my arrival. Even little bears can be dangerous, and our host was concerned…

I was watching the sun set behind the foothills that surround Bear Lake, which straddles the Idaho-Utah border just ten miles from Wyoming. Sunsets are beautiful, but after them comes the night. We often refer to the end of something as a sunset, and I wonder if we are thinking about the night that may…

I have very large feet. Not large in the NBA basketball player sense, but certainly large in the everyman sense. It has always been hard for me to buy socks. One-size-fits-all socks do not fit me. Shopping at the “Big and Tall” store as a teenager was really terrible. Currently, online shopping has made my…

In 1814, Russian poet and fabulist, Ivan Krylov, wrote “The Inquisitive Man”. This fable tells of a man who goes to a museum and notices all sorts of tiny things but fails to notice an elephant. This is where we get the proverbial phrase “the elephant in the room”, meaning the obvious thing that everyone…

Do you ever feel like your life is out of control? In the song “Locomotive Breath,” Jethro Tull sings: Oh, he feels the piston scrapingSteam breaking on his browOld Charlie stole the handleAnd the train it won’t stop going, No it won’t slow down Tull said the song was about overpopulation. It’s definitely not about a…

One of my sons ate a PB&J sandwich every day for lunch through lower and middle school (this was before they banned peanuts). The PB&J is far from a gourmet meal. It’s pedestrian. It’s simple. It is also healthy. A peanut butter and jelly sandwich can be a nutritionally balanced meal filled with protein, healthy…

It’s officially football season again. On Saturday, we got to watch our first game in the newly renovated south section of Boone Pickens Stadium (Go Pokes!). Our seats are perfect—on the 50 yd line and far enough up so we are in the shade for midday games. I’ve had seats in the first few rows,…

I have always loved fire and explosions. By the time I was a teenager, I had accidentally set our detached garage on fire three times, learned how to distill wood alcohol, and made my own fireworks (yes, you can make black powder from common ingredients at home). While I was part “mad scientist,” I also…