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September 1
In New Zealand, September 1 is Random Acts of Kindness day. Official suggestions about what you might do (randomly of course) includes washing someone else’s car or paying for the person behind you in a drive-through line. Out of 13 ideas for suggested activities, six of them have to do with transportation (they would be Continue reading
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A Short Essay on the Official Procedure for Breaking-in New Tennis Balls
I like to play with tennis balls; got new ones. They’re okay, but I have to fix ‘em up a bit before they’re fit for play. They need the outsides ripped and torn. And next get rolled around. Not in grass, but in some dirty, muddy patch of ground. Then I leave them in the Continue reading
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Was that bali…high?
The incredible two-headed heffalump It’s not unusual for an English word to have quite a few unrelated meanings, or even turn out to be more than one word with the same sound. As you might think, this happens more often with words that have been around for centuries. It’s also more common with simpler one- Continue reading
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August 31
Since August 31st is National Trail Mix Day, and also National Language Day (in Moldova), we should all practice saying “mix de trasee,” which is “Trail Mix” in Romanian. Why Romanian? Well, Moldova has its own language (Moldovan, obviously), but on a closer look, it turns out that Moldovan and Romanian are identical — the Continue reading
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Families
Families are funnyAnd mine is — a lot.It’s my sister and meAnd the humans we’ve got. When you see us togetheryour jaw might be dropted(Don’t tell thembut they were adopted.) -Chocolate Continue reading
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Ernest Rutherford
We all learned, at least at a basic level, about atoms, radioactivity, atomic numbers of elements, and the like. For all of it we can thank Ernest Rutherford, who was born August 30, 1871 in New Zealand. At the time he was born, New Zealand was still a colony, not an independent country. In 1887, Continue reading
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Who’s in charge here?
Don’t bother asking who’s the bossI’ll tell you right now: it’s me. When everybody does what I say to doThings will be great. You’ll see! -Chocolate Continue reading
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A net gain
What we know as “tennis” is not the original game of tennis. The original tennis is probably derived from the French word “tenez,” which means “look out!” — probably because it’s a game in which somebody uses a racquet to hit a ball at you as hard as they can. Tennis was played as early Continue reading
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All Wet
Humans never shake themselves!They never even try. What I can’t figure out is this:How do they get dry? -Chocolate Continue reading
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August 30
Now that the pandemic is over and world travel is again a reasonable activity, you might decide to visit as exotic a location as you could find. Even one that might be pretty hard to find, like, for example, East Timor. Timor is an island at the southern end of the island chains in southeast Continue reading
About Me
I’m Pete Harbeson, a writer located near Boston, Massachusetts. In addition to writing my own content, I’ve learned to translate for my loquacious and opinionated pup Chocolate Bossypaws. I shouldn’t be surprised, but she mostly speaks in doggerel. You can find her contributions tagged with Chocolatiana.
Check out my other blog, Techlimitics, where I’m grappling with the nature of simplicity.
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Contact
peterharbeson@me.com