Reading the Republican newspaper and found this information in their science section.The source is Harvard College. “In September 1918, at Fort Devens, outside of Boston, the world’s worst pandemic flu got its start. The Camp hospital, built to house 1200 soldiers, was overflowing from the war injuries with more than […]

Sweden May Have the Answer says ABC news. A friend of mine is trying to quit, this might be helpful. “Sweden has developed a safer, less toxic kind of smokeless tobacco called “snus,” and sales are booming. “In two or three years, we’re going to sell as much in cigarettes […]

Michael Agger wrote in slate about what happens when student ratings for college professors are viewable on line…and what they want from their profs… “Don’t play favorites, yet don’t deny students extra credit or a second chance on a paper or test. Don’t “get sidetracked by boring crap.” Don’t refer […]

Mimi Hall writes in USA TODAY about a grand idea. “A once-radical idea to build a 2,000-mile steel-and-wire fence on the U.S.-Mexican border is gaining momentum amid warnings that terrorists can easily sneak into the country. In Congress, a powerful Republican lawmaker this week proposed building such a fence across […]

Helene Cooper wrote an op-ed piece in yesterday’s NY Times titled “Waiting for their Moment in the Worst Place on Earth to be a Woman.” She discussed the recent election of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf in her native Liberia, Africa’s first woman president, and she contrasted that country with another miserable place, […]

The AP today ran a story about how hard it is to get students to finish college. While for decades higher education leaders focused on getting more and more high schoolers to enroll in college, today, just 54% of them ever get a degree–six years later! The era of the […]

Steve stopped by Computer Cleaners yesterday. A shaggy haired fellow computer geek who owns a shop in Hadley, he was coming to visit his northern brethren, and he chatted for a while. He said that old style computer monitors use about 100 watts each, like a big lightbulb burning all […]

Pakistan’s leading human rights organisation, the Ansar Burney Welfare Trust, said jihadi groups fighting the Indian government were taking orphans off the streets and putting them in training camps. The Times on line and little green footballs had this story today. The organisation said it also had evidence that sympathetic […]