A man is flying in a hot air balloon and realizes he is lost. He reduces height and spots a man down below. He lowers the balloon further and shouts, “Excuse me. Can you help me? I promised my client that I would meet him half an hour ago, but I don’t know where I […]
Calculus and alcohol—don’t drink and derive. (old calculus joke)
There are no such thing as problems, only opportunities. — Author unknown
I am currently reading the book Reaching Out by Henri J. M. Nouwen. In this book, Nouwen describes three type of movements or spectrums. Nouwen views our spiritual “ascent” as evolving in three movements. The first movement, loneliness to solitude, focuses on the spiritual life as it relates to the experience of our own selves. […]
Yesterday was the last day of classes for seniors at the high school where I teach. I always have mixed emotions about the last day of school. (I have another last day of school to go through with the underclassmen.) The last day is further complicated since most of my seniors are exempt from their […]
On the last day of class, one of my seniors disrespected me in a major way. I have seen her show disrespect toward other teachers and students over the last two years, but the frequency has increased during the last month or so. On occasion, she would do little things to me too. But this […]
Can you see the word “sex” in this integral?
Well, let’s see. When I’m an old, decrepit man, sitting in my wheel chair in some nursing home and somebody mentions the name ‘Bart’, I will remember math, goats, and sex.
Once on a trigonometry test, I accidently transposed the letters “c” and “x” in sec x (read as “secant x”) as sex c. (And the spell checker missed it too!)
I was driving down the interstate this morning and began to thing about control. Within all the rush hour traffic, I realized that the only control I really had was the space in front of me, that space between myself and the car in front of me. Sure, I was controlling the steering wheel, how […]
The best place to be during a graduation is with the seniors lining up before the ceremony. There was a positive energy, with a hint of happy anxiety, that filled the air at last night’s graduation. The students were beaming. Of course, there were a couple seniors whose body language and attitude showed that they […]
This one is from an email floating around the Internet: Sometimes we wonder, what did I do to deserve this, or why did God have to do this to me? Here is a wonderful explanation! A daughter is telling her Mother how everything is going wrong, she’s failing algebra, her boyfriend broke up with her […]
At Heathrow Airport today, an individual, later discovered to be a public school teacher, was arrested trying to board a flight while in possession of a compass, a protractor, and a graphing calculator. Authorities believe he is a member of the notorious Al’Gebra movement. He is being charged with carrying weapons of math instruction.
I have been fortunate to witness two events in the last week that touched my heart in a new and profound way. In both events, I felt God’s presence. During both events, a duality came about where part of me participated in the events, and another part of me stepped out of myself and witnessed […]
The Mars Global Surveyor took this picture of Earth (image on left) from the orbit of Mars on May 8, 2003 at 8:00 am CDT. (The image on the right has a map superimposed on the left image to indicate the early morning sun over North and South America.) “This is the first image of […]
Fifty years ago today, Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay were the first to reach the summit of Mt. Everest.
I was wondering why the Bush administration pushed through a tax cut in such hard economic times and ever increasing budget deficits. I don’t remember anybody complaining too much about taxes. I don’t understand much about finances, but it seems to go against common sense to reduce your income when your outflow has stayed the […]
I remember reading one of those “Question for the Day” calendars a few years ago. One group of questions really hit me in a profound way. It changed the way I took photos. What type of photos do you like to take most often? Are they photos of landscapes, inanimate objects, or of people? [Be […]