Tomorrow I will walk my daughter out my back door to her highly rated elementary school for the first time. I’ve been so excited for this day, more excited than she is. For me, school was such a joy, and I loved exploring the world so much, I stayed in it for 24 years. I hope that she finds the same inspiration, fun and support that I did. I hope I hope I hope.
Education and the Status of Women. And OMG my Baby is Grown Up and Leaving Me.
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Atheism and all that.
It’s been a difficult week. This day last week I was giggling over some funny conversation with my sister, when my friend Jaime asked whether I had seen the news. I got a familiar sinking feeling that something horrible had happened, and I was right. I almost cried reading that an eight year old boy […]
Branching Out
So, as I start my new little venture, trying to make a fortune bringing science to the people (wish me luck on that) I’ve been continuing my work schmoozing and boozing. I’m volunteering for a conference here in Calgary at the end of May, called Pathways 2 Sustainability, and if you’re in the Calgary area […]
Canada’s Greatest Know It All Episode Eight: Last Nerd Standing
So close. So very close. But what an epic finale. The finale included seven challenges meant to eliminate the eight and ninth competitor, leaving only the winner standing. So on the morning of the second last day of shooting, Owen, Andrew and I climbed three different ladders to reach the roof of the warehouse that […]
Canada’s Greatest Know It All Episode Seven: Which Came First, the Nerd or the Egg?
Around about the time that we moved to individual challenges a strange sort of magic happened to me. I don’t know what it was, but I remember talking to my sister who said that I may just win this thing, mostly because I didn’t seem to care as much if I won or not. Which […]
Canada’s Greatest Know It All Episode Six: Potato Gun Justice
You know, it’s a shame that something as lovely as having Canada’s Wonderland to ourselves was wasted on everyone but Laura. I think she’s the only one who was excited about the rides. Though, to be fair it’s not like we were let loose and told to enjoy ourselves. We were herded to a selection […]
Canada’s Greatest Know It All, Episode Five: If a Nerd Falls in the Forest, Does Anybody Hear?
The day that we showed up on set and were asked to make world maps, I thought huh, ok, that sounds difficult but whatever. Then Andrew asked if the projection should be Mercator, and I thought that there might be trouble brewing. An hour later we came to the other side of the barrier and […]
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Are Humans Getting Dumber?
Reality television would suggest that people are getting dumber, my recent foray into the genre excepted, of course. In general, I’ve found that it is a postmodern anthem to talk about the disappointments and failures of humanity. A friend, Douglas Hicton of Canada’s Greatest Know It All AND Jeopardy fame, recently showed me this article. […]
Canada’s Greatest Know It All Episode Four: The Bro Wars.
This episode was the one I was looking forward to the most. The day of the sky diving challenge we were unceremoniously carted to some exotic southern Ontario locale. We knew that something was different because there were cameras in the car, which was unusual. Still, I steadfastly refused to speculate because that sort of […]
Human Nature
I perennially run across ideas that make me nuts. I was going to write about what constitutes good evidence (as in “both sides of the vaccine issue have their evidence” when in actuality – one side does not), but got thinking about something more fundamental: what’s the nature of humanity? Here’s a question: if I […]
