Whenever I’m feeling down, I can always count on scientific research to cheer me up. You never know what crazy things researchers will try next. They have the minds of mischievous 3-year-olds. And they get paid to play. For example, scientific researchers, through actual studies and ...
Once again, I discover that I am well above average. According to a new study, Americans require 60 lazy days a year to feel rested and relaxed. Sixty? Only 60? Ha! I can be lazy 160 days a year. Probably even 360. Why not the full 365? Because sometimes due to circumstances beyond my ...
After a dressing down from my medical health professional, I have been on a quest to eat a healthy diet. That is to say, instead of eating a whole batch of chocolate chip cookie dough in one sitting, I’ll down only two cookies’ worth of dough. That’s enough to cleanse my palate of the ...
“I’m going for the gold,” she said. “That’s nice.” I nodded. “Or maybe the silver. Do you think I should pick the red instead?” “I don’t care. Get one purple, and one orange. Whatever. Just pick something. Shoe shopping isn’t an Olympic event.” She tsk-tsked me. “If it was, we’d have to buy that display case on the other side of the thrift store for all my medals.” Basketball is a competitive sport. The marathon is a competitive sport. Dancing with swirly ribbons on a floor mat is… I’m not sure about that one. But I know that shopping is NOT a ...
You wouldn’t know it, but I grew up among outdoorsmen. Most of my neighbors were sportsmen. At this very minute, a great deal of my uncles and cousins probably are tromping through some marshy timberland or are splashing about some lake or stream in an overly optimistic quest to slap something on the supper table. Besides Cap’n Crunch. Through some apparent mutation of my genes, I lost my way to the great outdoors. As a boy, I could hunt black bear in the woods behind our family farm any time I wished. “But Burton, no bears live around here,” one of my he-man cousins ...
It began when I was 4 years old. I found a baby blanket with the satin binding ripped loose on one end. I slipped my head through the loop that it formed, and that’s when it happened — I was Underdog! Underdog’s cape was solid blue, while mine was white with pink and blue bunnies on it, but it didn’t matter. I had a cape, so I was a superhero. Simon Bar Sinister, you had a need to fear because Underdog — and his bunny cape — was here! I pedaled my tricycle around the driveway as fast as my legs could pump, hoping the cape would flap in the wind, because — I was ...
