Ice

Today was clear and cold. That proved problematic for me.

As part of my bike commute to work, I make a left turn through a busy intersection. I usually move into the left turn lane and turn with traffic on a green arrow, as instructed by my state’s bike safety manual. Today was no different… until I reached the middle of the intersection.

A patch of black ice had formed on the asphalt, and I didn’t see it. I started to turn. I had a fraction of a second to realize that something wasn’t quite right about the way my wheels were responding before the bike slipped right out from under me.

For a moment, I felt like I was in some kind of action movie. More than once I’ve seen a scene in which a motorcycle rider turns sharply and drops, letting the bike slide across the ground usually to avoid some deadly collision or to create an explosion. Similarly, though without the flair, I sat down hard on the asphalt and watched for a second or two as my bike skidded across more ice, wheels-first, in the general direction of the opposing traffic (which was still stopped by a red light).

I stood up quickly, grabbed my ride, and rushed it to the sidewalk. I think I even laughed while doing so, which was probably just a side-effect of the flood of epinephrine hitting my bloodstream. I was unhurt save for some minor impact-related pain in my left thigh. The bike was fine save for a scrape on the left pedal and a dislodged chain. It was easily fixed, and I was on my way again.

I think it was more embarrassing than anything else. I was confidently and capably riding through an intersection one moment; I was sitting on the ground and blocking traffic the next moment with a dozen pairs of headlights pointed straight at me. On one hand, I’m glad I was able to get right up and out of the way so quickly. On the other hand, I almost feel like I should have made more of a show of it by looking up at some of the motorists, shrugging nonchalantly, and laughing at my predicament.

I may know how to drive on icy roads. I guess I haven’t quite learned how to properly bike on them yet.

Characterization

I read a lot of books. When I read fiction, I want believable characters. I can think of several ways in which an author could ruin a good story, but one of the most prominent ways is to write unrealistic characters.

I recently read Sir Apropos of Nothing by Peter David. It was a fairly standard fantasy-style adventure story with several well-crafted satirical passages. The main character was a unique person. He was a kind of anti-hero who did not want fame and glory, who did not want to save the princess or the world, and who really didn’t want much more than to take care of his own personal needs. Through a highly amusing series of events, he finds himself doing much more than he had planned and getting much more than he wanted. I can’t say that he always reacted the way I expected him to react because some of his actions were unorthodox, even in a fantasy realm. However, everything he did was believable because it fit with the personality and history the author had established for him, such as repeatedly attempting to just take the money and run when financial compensation or reward was offered to him.

I followed that book with a science fiction novel called Back to the Moon by Homer H. Hickam, Jr. The science in the book was reasonably sound, involving retrofitting a single large engine onto a NASA shuttle while in orbit and taking the shuttle to the moon to find a rare substance that could provide fuel for clean and safe energy production on earth. Toward the end of the book, I did start to get a little tired of the continuous miraculous escapes from certain-death situations, but overall, I enjoyed the narrative of the adventure. Or, rather, I would have enjoyed it if I didn’t have to put up with such flat characters. They had clear personalities, but their actions did not match their motivations. One main character, Jack, had lost his wife in a tragic accident, and the author repeatedly described how much Jack missed his wife terribly, couldn’t think of being with any other woman, and even scoffed at death because of how little he felt he had left to lose. Another main character, Penny, openly admitted to a strong dislike of men, and her actions toward all the other male characters she met seemed to solidify that. Then, suddenly, while on the shuttle somewhere between Earth and the Moon, Jack and Penny decided to hook up and were portrayed as lovers for the remainder of the story, even with more mentions of Jack’s deceased wife and Penny’s bad encounters with men. The relationships were forced (at best), and I frequently found myself wanting to argue with the author about what a real person would do in these fictional situations.

A story is only as good as the people in it.

Compatibility

Today I received many exciting gifts from friends and family, and I gave them things that I hope they will enjoy as well. One gift from my wife was particularly noteworthy. It was a Christmas tree ornament in which I had recently shown interest. I want to tell its story.

A few weeks ago, we attended a Christmas event that included a display of many “Nativity” or “Creche” scenes depicting the most widely accepted story of the birth of Christ. Among those displays, I found one small ceramic figure that I found fascinating. It showed a baby boy, loosely wrapped in white cloth, laying in a manger of hay. Opposite the baby was a modern Santa Claus figure with the full white beard, red suit with white trim, and black boots. He had removed his hat and was clutching it to his chest, revealing a bald head as he knelt before the child. It was clear that the Santa Claus figure was humbling himself before the Christ child in reverence and respect.

The juxtaposition of the two iconic figures struck me first as an incompatibility. Many Christians often complain that the Christmas holiday, which is, among other things, a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ, has become too “commercialized,” and they often cite Santa Claus as a culprit. They do not like the idea that a day they use a religious holiday has been usurped by a figure that, for some, can be seen to stand for greed and obsession with material possessions. This almost makes the Christmas holiday feel like 24 hours of Dissociative Identity Disorder. Santa Claus or Jesus Christ—one or the other, but never both.

But it seems to me that some short-sightedness has come into play here. The American version of Santa Claus is not the only one, and his modern image is far-removed from its origins. Santa Claus was not always seen as a magical fat man who lives to bribe children with toys in exchange for good behavior. His story started with that of the philanthropic Saint Nicholas, an early Christian who must have accepted the Biblical account of the birth, life, and death of Jesus Christ and who, given the opportunity, would naturally have knelt at the manger.

Even the modern story of Santa Claus is not meant to incite greed and condone bribery. It can be used as an example of generosity, which is a trait that often seems sorely lacking in our society.

Some people claim that Jesus Christ is a myth and those who believe in him sorely misguided. More claim that Santa Claus is also a myth and that thousands of children worldwide are deliberately led down paths of inevitable disappointment and disillusionment. However, if we can for just a moment accept that both figures do exist, is it really that great a stretch of the imagination to believe that Santa Claus is just a man (with extraordinary abilities and means) who wants to follow the example of Jesus Christ (whom he has accepted as the son of God and as his savior) by doing some good for the rest of humanity by bringing smiles to the faces of the world’s children?

The two stories can be compatible… if we let them.

Appetite

Spiders do eat other spiders.

I’m sure I’ve read or heard that before, and I don’t suppose it should really come as much of a surprise to me. Still I was skeptical of this “fact” until today, in spite of knowing that some female spiders eat the males that come courting.

Cannibalism is not uncommon. Praying mantises eat their mates. Wild chimpanzees sometimes kill and eat other chimpanzees from rival social groups. Numerous animal species have been known to eat their own young. It may be rare, but humans do eat other humans on occasion.

I suppose it’s just surprising to actually see such a thing happen.

I was at my computer. I noticed a tiny spider (not much larger than the head of a pin) descending on a thread about two inches from the window frame. On the wall next to it was another spider that I recognized as the “jumping” variety (I have long been slightly unnerved by that type of spider because of their tendency to lean back, look at me, and sometimes even wave a leg or other appendage at me), which was two or three times the size of the other one. As the dangling spider slowly descended, the jumping spider would hop a little further down the wall. Suddenly, the jumping spider jumped (which should not have surprised me, considering the name of the creature, but it did anyway) away from the wall, caught the dangling spider, fell back to the wall thanks to an anchor line it had released as it jumped, and hopped a few more inches to the corner between the wall and the window frame.

Fascinating.

I did some research later and learned that this is perfectly normal behavior for jumping spiders. They are predators of other spiders and will typically drop an anchor before attacking. According to my research, they pose little or no threat to humans, and, if allowed to live in or near a house, can even significantly reduce the likelihood of more aggressive or dangerous spiders taking up residence.

Word

I recently read a book about philosophy. One chapter touched on the difficulties that software developers have encountered while trying to create artificial intelligence. One of their major hurdles has been programming a computer (or robot or other machine) to understand human speech. I understood the explanation in the book well enough to read the chapter without confusion, but I doubt I could repeat it. Suffice it to say that language is much more complicated than it seems and that tonal and contextual nuances in speech can drastically change the meaning of a word or sentence.

As much as I complain about it (which I frequently do), this knowledge gives me a new respect for the programmers who created the grammar-checker in Microsoft Word. It’s not perfectly accurate. It has warned me about sentence fragments when I didn’t have any, and it frequently points out nonexistent subject-verb agreement errors. I even got it into an infinite loop once where it convinced me to correct what it thought was an error only to tell me to correct the correction back to the original, which it thought was still wrong. I realize now what an impressive bit of programming it really is.

However, Word’s grammar-checker is not perfectly reliable. It misses errors all the time because it does not understand the contextual facets of language. It is not a substitute for old-fashioned proofreading.

At work the other day, I received an informational email about a series of health and safety videos available to employees and accessible through the organization’s intranet. One of those videos was about breathing and asthma. It was titled “Breath Easy.” The person who created the title failed to add an “e,” and Word didn’t catch the error. It knows that “breath” and “breathe” are two different words, and it knows that one is a noun and the other a verb, but it does not know which of the two words should be used in a phrase with “easy.”

Shortly after receiving the email about easing my breath, I got another bit of advice about leaving packages and shopping bags in the car. It was suggested that I should keep such things “out of plain site.” This is even more difficult for Word to deal with because “sight” and “site” are both correctly-spelled nouns, but the difference in their meanings is significant.

I don’t think the English language is being destroyed as some die-hard grammarians might insist. However, I do think it is being severely beaten by people who either did not get a good education (because of a poor school system, because of an incompetent teacher, or because of personal inabilities or laziness) and who do not now care enough to take the extra time to make sure their writing is correct.

But until I figure out what to do about this problem, I’ll be sure to keep my purchases out of plain location after I go shopping.

Recency

In the first post I made on this blog, I referred to the opening line in Charles Dickens’ novel A Christmas Carol. Today I watched the video version of that story as told by Jim Henson’s Muppets. In doing so, I discovered a mistake.

I quoted the opening line of the story this way:
“The Marleys were dead, to begin with.”
In reality, Dickens wrote:
”Marley was dead, to begin with.”

Where did I go wrong? Why did I make a plural where it should have been singular?

Dickens told of only one man named Marley (Jacob) who had died and returned in spirit to warn his mortal colleague, Ebenezer Scrooge, of the horrors that awaited selfish men in the next life. To make use of their existing characters, the Muppet team pluralized that figure into two men named Marley (Jacob and Robert) and used the two old hecklers (Statler and Waldorf) to represent them. For any Muppet fan, having Statler without Waldorf or the other way around is just not right.

My error was likely caused, in part, by the recency effect. It has been a long time since I read A Christmas Carol. I have seen the Muppet retelling several times after my initial reading, giving my brain a chance to accept that version as correct simply because it is the most recent in my memory.

Delay

It’s easy to fall behind. I know that this blog has limited readership. It may seem that I have abandoned it. However, allow me to offer my assurances to those few who are interested in the odd ideas that flutter across my mind that I have not stopped thinking, nor have I stopped recording my thoughts. In fact, I have several topics and posts ready to go. I’m just having trouble keeping them organized while keeping up with all the other things that happen in the “real world” around me.

Additional tales of cognitive boredom are forthcoming, and I will backdate some of them according to the time that they occurred, which will fill in the current six-month gap.

Transubstantiation

Moving water and moving air often have the same sound.

When I go camping, I seldom sleep all the way through the night. If I’ve pitched my tent next to a river or stream, I’ll hear it when I wake up (either during the night or early in the morning) and think, in my still-partially-asleep state that it is the sound of wind, not water. I’ll think to myself that the wind must have picked up during the night and begin wondering if I staked down the tent well enough to keep it from blowing over.

As I write this post, I’m in a hotel room near the beach, and through a window to my left, I can hear the waves of the Pacific Ocean crashing against the sandy shore. Every few minutes, the computer’s fan will come on and run just long enough for me to notice it. I hear a rushing sound similar to that made by the pounding surf, but it is coming from in front of me instead of from the window. Confused, I look up and try to locate the source of the sound, wondering whether there is another open window that I didn’t know about somewhere in the room. I quickly notice that it is just the computer fan and go back to work.

Air sounds like water. Water sounds like air. Sometimes fire can sound like air or water. I’ve never experienced it, but I suppose that a landslide could mimic the sounds of a waterfall or tornado.

On one hand, it makes me marvel at the human brain, knowing that, if I pay attention, it can distinguish those sounds enough to recognize them. On the other hand, it also makes me realize that our sense of hearing is not nearly as finely-tuned and well-developed as we might like to think it is.

Explorer

Lately, every time I hear or use the phrase “the other day” at the beginning of a sentence, I think of Unlce Traveling Matt from Jim Henson’s Fraggle Rock. He had a unique way of vocalizing that phrase with a kind of happy self-importance, as if he expected everyone around him to immediately drop whatever they were doing and eagerly listen to his fascinating and relevant tale.

I wonder if anybody would recognize it if I attempted to imitate him.

Gesundheit

I find the customs related to sneezing somewhat amusing. It is one of the few "noisy" bodily functions that is socially acceptable and even politely accepted, most cases. Coughing rarely brings out a sympathetic response from others unless it goes on for a prolonged period or is accompanied by choking gasps, but it is tolerated as long as the one doing the coughing covers his or her mouth in one way or another. Hiccups are either ignored or laughed at. Audible burps are considered mildly embarrassing (at least, in most public situations in America) for the one doing the burping, and he or she is afterward expected to request the pardon of the others present. Passing gas generates a wide variety of responses, depending on the individuals present to perceive it, and I won't go into detail on that for now, but it is definitely not socially acceptable.

Sneezing is different. When I sneeze, I cover my mouth and nose, usually by pressing them into the crook of my arm. In nearly all social situations, someone around me will soon say, "Bless you," or, "Gesundheit," or some variant of those phrases. Tales of the origins of this practice are varied, and they are interesting, but I am more interested in the modern usage.

Take my workplace, for example. If one person sneezes, another person nearby will soon say, "Bless you!" The sneezer is then expected to express gratitude for the statement, though it is still a mystery to me as to how anybody truly benefits from it. If the "thank you" step is ignored, the sneezer is considerably less likely to hear a "bless you" after a future sneeze.

I can discern no rules--other than proximity, though that seems to have several variants on its own--that regulate which person is supposed "bless" the sneezer. I have, however, determined that social messages are embedded within the length of time between the sneeze and the invocation of the sneeze blessing.

If it is immediate, then the person offering the "bless you" is aware of the sneezer on a personal level.
If it is delayed by a second or two, then the person offering the "bless you" is still aware of the sneezer, though perhaps on a slightly less personal level, but was likely waiting to see if any more sneezes were forthcoming.
If it is delayed by several seconds, then the person offering the "bless you" is only aware of the social requirements driving the statement and said it simply because he or she was in proximity and because no one else had said it first.

What I want to know is how long the window of opportunity stays open for a person to say "bless you." At what point after the sneeze does the statement lose its positive social value and dive toward insult. If a person waits a full minute and still says "bless you," does that action indicate the person simply does not care enough about the sneezer to do anything right away, or does it indicate that the person is oblivious, forgetful, or not fully aware of the passage of time?

Still, sneezes can be funny. Like the other day...
Me: *Sneeze!*
Co-worker 1: Bless you.
Me: *Sneeze!*
Co-worker 1: *Laugh!*
Co-worker 2: Bless you! Geez!
Me: *Sneeze!*
Co-worker 3: Okay, knock it off already. Now you're just doing it for attention.

Alien

As a kid, I used to make up my own words for things. I don't mean that I made up new combinations of familiar words to describe something with which I was unfamiliar (though I did that--thinking that French toast was very similar to pancakes in the way it was cooked and eaten, I called it "pan toast" until I could pronounce "French"). I mean fully made up words--random syllables strung together in no particular pattern with just enough structure to sound like speech. I was likely following English linguistic patterns (for example, the ng sound never occurs at the beginning of a word, most unstressed vowels are softened to the schwa sound, etc.), but since none of the "words" I spoke were anything I'd ever heard before, it counted as a foreign language to me.

Once, I even sat down with a dictionary and tried to write down a word-for-word translation of my language. I got as far as "aardvark" before deciding that it would take too long.

I still use made-up words, though. Writing fiction, especially sci-fi and fantasy, I have to make up words from time to time to describe objects or events that do not exist in any reality I know. But I use made-up words in other situations, too. And, for some reason that I haven't figured out, most of them are lifted in one way or another from Star Wars VI: Return of the Jedi.

My most common computer password is a phonetic spelling of a word spoken by one of the many aliens on Tatooine. Though I combine it with numbers and symbols as well to make it more secure, I can't imagine that any person would be able to guess it, and I expect that it could foil many basic password-guessing hacking tools as well for the simple fact that it is rather long and does not appear in any dictionary or even in a Google search.

When I'm annoyed, instead of swearing, I might mutter under my breath an Ewok utterance. It's one of the first things viewers hear any of the Ewoks say, and it sounds something like "ee-CHOOT-tha." It makes for a good grumble.

I suppose I should be careful, though. I can't use any words from Star Wars languages in my writing. I might get in trouble for copyright infringement or something. That is, if anybody ever figures out how to accurately transcribe Wookiee.

Backdating

Backdating is entering a previous date on a record or document. For example, if I wrote this observation on 29 August 2010 but marked it as 01 July 2010, I would be backdating the entry.

In the legal arena and in businesses and organizations subject to FDA regulations, this is a federal offense because it falsifies information in a way that could prove detrimental to a person's independence, financial standing, or health.

Fortunately, my blog is not regulated by the FDA.

My reason for backdating? Let's call it "technical difficulties." And by that, let's mean, "Technically, I don't have any difficulty procrastinating."

Companionship

I often see homeless people as I commute to and from work. Generally, they're just standing or sitting on the side of the road with their standard cardboard signs, hoping a passer-by will offer a handout of some kind. I'll also see some of them relaxing under a tree near a highway off-ramp or at the edge of a retail parking lot. Most of the time, I try to assume that they really are in desperate need of cash for food or other essentials, but I know that's not true for all of them.

Recently, however, I have noticed a number of homeless people who have a pet dog with them. I've seen three or four people now, each with a dog in tow, and it got me thinking.

If you're out of cash and nearly desperate for food, why would you willingly bring along a pet? It needs food and water just as much as you do, and it doesn't understand the concepts of sharing or rationing. It's just another mouth to feed. Having one along seems counter-intuitive to me.

However, I can easily understand the need for companionship. Having a job and an apartment (and even family) can somehow seem lonely at times. Undoubtedly, being alone while surrounded by deliberately oblivious strangers would magnify that loneliness. Having an animal along provides some other being to talk to and share experiences with, even if it doesn't understand what's going on. Still, I can also imagine a point where I would choose food over companionship.

It's also possible that they're keeping dogs with them for protection. I sometimes feel vulnerable enough behind a locked door. An extra set of eyes and ears (not to mention sharp teeth) would easily offer a sense of security in an otherwise completely insecure setting and may even serve to reduce psychological stress.

My first thought upon seeing a homeless person and his pet was that if he could afford to feed and keep the dog, he didn't really need an extra handout from me. Now I'm not so sure. Perhaps the down-and-out man (or woman) and his (or her) dog are really a package deal. Perhaps one really does need the other in more ways than I can know without experiencing the situation for myself.

Now my question is: Who chose whom? Man or beast?

Meteorology

Is anyone ever satisfied with the current weather conditions?

Everywhere I go, I hear someone talking about the weather. And, as much as I try, I can't help occasionally joining the conversation. It's a universal topic, I suppose, because we cannot control it, and we are all influenced by it in one way or another. Still, I've been paying attention to how people talk about the weather lately, and I've noticed a few trends.

1- Conversation about what the weather is "supposed to" do. This stems from watching meteorologists on TV attempt to predict upcoming weather conditions based on current conditions and complex atmospheric modeling systems. I find that they're frequently accurate when it comes to temperatures but almost never accurate regarding precipitation. However, there are people who take the weather forecasts as definite plans, explain what the weather is going to do in the next few days, and how they intend to react to it, then promptly complain that the meteorologists are never right.

2- A casual debate about the quality of the weather. One person mentions that he or she enjoyed the previous day's sunshine. Another person will complain that it was too hot. The first person will then agree and express a hope that temperatures will become more pleasant in the near future. The second person complains about the usual causes of cooler weather, such as clouds and rain or wind. The first person agrees that all those things are unpleasant. I (as an observer) note that these people must only be happy in climate-controlled buildings.

3- Pointing out the obvious. "It's raining." "Yes, it is."

I like the rain. When it leaves, I enjoy seeing the sun again. When it comes back, I welcome the clouds. Hot weather means I can leave the windows open at night. Cold weather means soup for lunch and more blankets on the bed.

It's probably a good thing we can't control the weather anyway. Not only would we manage to screw it all up somehow, only the person who had access to the weather-control system would ever be happy with the results.

iFriend

What does this say of our society?

I saw two girls (if I had to guess their ages, I'd say they were sophomores in high school or just a bit younger) walking down the sidewalk today. Each had a pair of earphones connected to her own personal music device. Judging by their proximity to one another and similar clothing styles, I had to assume that they were friends.

They did not speak. However, twice during the period I was stopped at a light and able to observe them, one would look at the other, smile, and nod her head in a rhythm (which likely coincided with the music she was listening to). The other would return the smile and nod her head as well, but to a distinctly different rhythmic pattern.

This counts as friendship these days? Listening to completely different music together? That's not social interaction at all!

Soft

Why are the backs of the conference room chairs padded?

I don't mean the seat back that I lean against when I'm sitting in the chair. I understand that padding, and I prefer it over hard plastic or metal.

I mean the back of the chair--the part I look at when approaching the chair from behind, the part that gets pushed up against the wall. Why is that part of the chair padded?

It's not like anybody's going to sit there...

Absorbency

I noticed something this morning. My breakfast cereals absorb the milk differently.

I think I always knew that, but it registered consciously today. I have to pour more milk in the bowl for some cereals than I do for others. It seems the "puffed" varieties require less milk to make the bowl look full enough but soak up more of it as I eat them, sometimes almost leaving me dry at the end, so I have to compensate by adding more than I think I need. The flakes seem to need more to make the bowl look full, but I often have too much milk left over when the cereal is gone, so I have to compensate for that by using less to begin with.

Now that I think about it, though, I realize that I'm assuming this has to do with cereal absorbency. I do think the "puffed" cereals can take up more fluid than the flakes can, simply because of their more porous nature, but it is possible that what I'm observing has more to do with the cereal's density, making me think that one type needs more milk than another because of some kind of optical illusion effect.

And here I just wanted breakfast.

Redundancy

I took a different route home from work today. I passed a furniture store. It sold only furniture, as evidenced by its name and slogan. For example's sake, let's say the store was Lots of Furniture and its slogan was "The best place to buy furniture." It had an elaborately painted advertisement on its front windows that said, "Furniture Sale."

Couldn't they have just called it a sale? Did they really have to specify that the sale covered furniture?

Graduation

For a long time, I thought that big graduation ceremonies and such were reserved for high school and college graduations. Those marked major milestones and/or major accomplishments. When I first heard about kindergarten graduations, I rolled my eyes. I didn't think that completing the first year of the American public education system deserved any special recognition.

I didn't get a kindergarten graduation ceremony.

My problem was the source of the idea for kindergarten graduation ceremonies: building a child's self-esteem. I don't want to make anybody think that self-esteem is bad or unnecessary, but I noticed the trend of kindergarten graduation during a time in which the self-esteem movement had many followers. People--parents, teachers, mental health professionals, family therapists, and many others--claimed that a positive self-esteem is so absolutely vital to a child's well-being and ability to grow up without becoming a serial murderer that everything had to have a positive spin. No more keeping score in sports, no more honor rolls listing the top achievers, easier assignments, more praise. I even heard that one teacher regularly responded to incorrect answers from her students by saying, "Well, that's the right answer to a different question." I found this movement absurd. A child who does not deal with childhood disappointments and failures will not grow up knowing how to deal with adulthood disappointments and failures.

I assumed that kindergarten graduations were part of the self-esteem thing, and it's likely that they were, but I have changed my opinion of them.

In some other "first world" and "developing" nations with compulsory education, the children perform better in nearly all subjects than American children do. Researchers propose that a major cause for this disparity has to do with culture. All children in all schools have to learn some difficult subjects, and few will report that school is always easy. But some have a different attitude toward it than others, and the attitude is usually that engendered by the adults in their lives.

In Russia, the first day of each school year is a national holiday, and it is customary for each child to bring flowers to his or her teacher. In another Asian country, children wear yellow hats on their first day of school, are escorted to the school by their parent(s), and are welcomed to the school by the older children. I've heard of schools in which children are rewarded with honey dropped on a writing tablet so that "learning becomes sweet" to them. In Jewish cultures, the most educated are the most revered; to be wealthy was good, but to be wise was better, as evidenced in Fiddler on the Roof when the lead character stated that he would like to be rich so he could spend his time studying scripture.

In America, we take our kids clothes shopping and plan what we're going to do when they have a vacation. We place more emphasis on sports or performance prowess than on learning. School and studying are viewed as means to an end, as unpleasant chores, almost as necessary evils.

Perhaps kindergarten graduation ceremonies, if they are used as a way of celebrating school and learning and not as a joyous escape from burdensome labor, can help us recapture the love of learning that should exist in childhood.

Beverage

For a variety of reasons, I rarely drink carbonated or caffeinated beverages. Today, I got a free 16-ounce Pepsi with my lunch. I made it last through the last four hours of work, drinking from it at a very slow but steady pace. I was able to observe the effects it had on me.

My body is simply not accustomed to carbonation or to caffeine.

The caffeine affected me first. I could actually feel when the chemical entered my bloodstream. My heart rate increased slightly. My blood pressure increased slightly. I had a marginally easier time keeping my eyes open through some mind-numbing tasks. After a little more of the drink, I noticed a vague tingling sensation within my chest that resembled the feeling I get when I've been flexing a muscle for too long (like when lifting and holding a heavy box) and suddenly relax it. I also noticed a tightness in my neck. Those sensations didn't increase any further as I finished the Pepsi, but I did become significantly more fidgety toward the end of my shift, to the point that I wondered if I could handle sitting still for the last half hour or so.

The carbonation affected my stomach a bit, giving me the tiniest hint at a suggestion of bloating. It affected my breathing more. As the carbon-dioxide entered my bloodstream and affixed to the red blood cells, there was less room for the necessary oxygen. I found myself breathing just a little deeper and just a little faster as a result.

I think I understand why I rarely drink such things any more, and I find myself becoming increasingly confused by people who have a soda with nearly every meal and/or several times throughout the day, by people who give soda to their children, and by people who live on coffee.