WHY do we go around buying other people’s wonderful “junque,” and then clean out the garage (urggghhh), gear up for the weekend, sit in the hot sun and try to get them to buy our junk? S’cuse me: “Unique junque!” More »

M13 is also called the “Great globular cluster in Hercules,” and is one of the most prominent and best known globulars of the Northern hemisphere. At its distance of 25,100 light years, it contains several 100,000 stars. Its age is approximated at about 14 billion years. More »

Family law lawyers are always concerned about the evidence obtained from social networking sites negatively impacting their clients’ custody and parenting time cases. Greater concerns loom, not only for divorced and divorcing families, but for all people using these sites. More »

I have a bias against toaster ovens.  This week the baking ignitor in my oven went out during the most gorgeous stretch of fall-like summer weather.  My husband, the Evil Genius, inexplicably has a love of toaster ovens and has been trying to bring me over to the dark side for years. He thinks I’m being close minded in my anti-toaster oven tendencies.  For my part, I suspect that he wants me to admit I like it so that I’ll switch over and do all my baking in it and the propane bills will drop precipitously.  Whatever.  More »

A recent article in the Gainesville Times by Amanda McIntosh raised an interesting question. Should either creationism or evolution be taught in elementary schools? More »

During my life,

I did some things

that resulted in me

Misusing Time. More »

This summer I have become a connoisseur of parks and playgrounds. (Yes, I had to look it up in the dictionary). This is how it came about. My little grand-niece, Emily, is now five and soon to be six as she will point out to you. I have been going to playgrounds with her for several years usually in the company of either her grandmother or grandfather. I was there the first time she ventured down a slide (Bryant Park). Last Fall we did a couple of short “hikes” on the TART and at the Boardman Nature Center. For several years, we have also been swimming together. More »

Recently I received a phone call from an Amish man.

He was telling me his sweet corn was ready and available, if I were to head down his way,
which would be a two-hour trip.  More »

At last, after a 3 1/2 month wait, and a change in an adapter, I can post my first deep sky object (DSO) with my new equipment. * M20, also known as the Trifid Nebula, is one of the most beautiful and most photographed of the northern sky’s deep sky objects. It is an unusual combination of an open cluster of stars, an emission nebula (the lower, red portion), a reflection nebula (the upper, blue portion) and a dark nebula (the apparent ‘gaps’ within the emission nebula that cause the trifid appearance). More »

Many state legislatures have recently enacted or proposed legislation to help divorced or separated military service members maintain their parent-child relationships during and after deployments. These laws (or proposed laws) are meant to restore the relationship he or she had with his or her children prior to deployment. More »