Grapes and Figs

I don't do Twitter because, well, I'm a curmudgeon. If they had called it somthing else, maybe I'd sign on. But I cut my teeth on my 1928 Webster's New International Dictionary. Every hard word J...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2010/04/archiving-twits.html

I ran across an article in the Economist lamenting the decline of the polymath. The article described the traditional polymath as a person with comprehensive knowledge of all or many fields. The...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2009/11/advice-for-purposeful-dilettante.html

Proper science is always descriptive. It seeks to be predictive. It never is prescriptive. I believe that confusing these categories is what is behind the muddled debate regarding the role of sc...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2009/11/role-of-science.html

Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg issued a stay on the sale of Chrysler to Fiat. This is an extraordinary move. Last Friday the Court of Appeals out of the 11th circuit, I believe it was ...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2009/06/government-fiat-purchase-by-fiat.html

A remarkable Washington Post story on how long-standing tax policy was changed by administrative notice hit the wires last Sunday. It’s not every day that a popular press story deals with an ...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2008/11/tax-breaks-for-big-guys-changing-tax.html

This is not advanced physics, but I often find myself figuring things about water supply. Here are a few numbers that rattle around in my head (I've also verified them against my Thomas J. Glover...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2008/09/thumbnail-water-constants.html

Here is a book every home should have: Household Arithmetic , Katherine F. Ball, M.A., Vocational Adviser (sic) for Women, University of Minnesota; Miriam E. West, M.A. Girls Vocational High Sch...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2008/08/useful-snippets-from-household.html

I've been fairly occupied for the last four months. School is done, but Summer had many projects. I'm coming back here from time to put record my random thoughts and observations. I put obscure ...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2008/08/return.html

If you are spending money on tuition for college, there is a "Hope Credit" available to reduce your taxes. I looked through the instructions of IRS Form 8863, which is what you file to get this c...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2008/01/if-you-are-spending-money-on-tuition.html

I was mucking about in my Hebrew lexicon, trying to figure out what Eliphaz's name meant. (Eliphaz the Temanite is one of Job's "friends" who offered cold comfort). "Eli", of course, means God. ...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/08/stumbling-upon-agile-sparkle.html

There's a bit of a buzz going on about the acquittal of Tom Cryer, a Lousiana attorney who had been charged with the federal crime of failing to file his tax returns. Misleading articles, such as...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/07/theres-bit-of-buzz-going-on-about.html

Suppose there is family down the street with a wayward son or daughter who is just not "right." Suppose this straying child has become enflamed about what is going on in Iraq. And suppose this ch...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/07/just-when-slumber-was-getting-pleasant.html

My state's bar association is sponsoring a continuing legal education program about "Lawyers’ Roles in Preparing and Responding to Disasters" . So the secret is out. Lawyers prepare disasters ...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/07/what-youve-always-suspected.html

I haven't had much to say lately. But the first crop of our golden and red raspberries are ripe. Yum.

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/06/at-least-there-are-berries.html

ARTICLE I, SECTION 8, OF THE US CONSTITUTION: "The Congress shall have power . . . To declare war, . . . ." ARTICLE VI, THIRD CLAUSE, US CONSTITUTION: "The Senators and Representatives before me...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/06/article-i-section-8-of-us-constitution.html

The War on Drugs gets even weirder. DEA agents now have authority to stop a suspected vehicle by pretending to be drunk and colliding into it with another vehicle. They then may pretend to steal ...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/06/dea-agents-get-creative.html

Helicopters hovered, hundreds of news cameramen gathered, breaking headlines worldwide, on the internet and, apparently, on televisions across the country. Yes, Paris is going back to jail. M...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/06/madness-and-blindness.html

One annoying aspect of modern life is the use of statistics to drive public opinion. Please, someone help me see why this example is not a particularly bad one: 100,000 Chinese die annually from...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/05/when-big-numbers-mean-nothing.html

About 20 years ago I was at the house of some relatives. Their four year old son was watching a television program called "Pee Wee's Playhouse" with some friends. I had never heard of the show, b...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/05/republicans-have-their-pee-wee-herman.html

Today, May 8, 2007, they found melamine was fed to fish, but it's not likely to cause any trouble. Farmed fish fed contaminated material But the safety of the fish isn't what caught my eye. I...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/05/dont-panic-fish-are-ok.html

A few days ago I posted a link about how Ron Paul was shut out of the May 15 South Carolina Republican debate by Fox News. Apparently he is going to be in it: South Carolina Republican Party A...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/05/update-on-ron-paul-in-south-carolina.html

Last week Lauren wrote about how Fox News decided to rig the Republican primary by keeping Ron Paul out of its debates. Everyone knows that Ron Paul is likely to make the other candidates look b...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/04/equal-opportunity-election-fixers.html

If a thief be found breaking up, and be smitten that he die, there shall no blood be shed for him. --Exodus 22:2 Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England: > Burglary, or nocturnal ho...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/04/brought-to-you-by-war-on-drugs.html

What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law: for I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet. But sin, taking occasion b...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/04/learning-sin-through-tax-code.html

And the LORD God took the man, and put him into the garden of Eden to dress it and to keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: ...

http://grapesandfigs.blogspot.com/2007/04/and-lord-god-took-man-and-put-him-into.html