Giving the third degree

People brag about how much more intuitive their particular systems of measurement are. For example, Americans will brag about how Fahrenheit is more intuitive: 0-100 degrees capture most outside temperatures (the actual extreme records are -128° to 134°, but those records are beyond absurd and probably not worth considering). Non-Americans brag about how Celsius is…

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Acceptance and Surprise

A good interlocutor should have the twin virtues of: Acceptance: not challenging you in ways you don’t need or want Surprise: challenging you in ways you need or want That is: they should accept you as you are and not add friction to your life…. unless you want them to. AND they should surprise you…

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The Political Mixer

So I’m watching Jon Haidt ((OMG, OMG, OMG, OMG)) and Joshua Knobe at Blogging Heads.  All of a sudden I hear Haidt, who I generally agree with on everything, ((I’d switch to codpieces if I found out he was against boxers.)) say something I’ve come to conclude is a half-thought out idea.  He eventually comes…

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You Can’t Make Old Friends

I talk and text with my middle school friends to this day. Some of us are going to Iceland on a group trip soon. If I’m honest, I do more texting than they do. We slowly text less and less often. I have lost track of some people. A lot of people. People who were…

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Our last tear

I forgot my ex-fiancée’s hairstyle. I realized that while high, camping alone in Wyoming. I had to look it up, but the thought made me cry. I think about her daily, sometimes with nostalgia, sometimes with sadness or guilt, sometimes I just remember her giggle or the way she wrinkled her nose. But I rarely…

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Ten Sunrises

My uncle once said, “how many more times am I going to see you? Ten?” I’d never considered the finitude of that relationship. Within a few years, his brother, another uncle of mine, died. He was 54. I saw him fewer than a dozen times in that period. Related posts: Two Top Ten Lists… sort…

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