I go ‘Berkoesque;’ Linda finds some pretty hikes in Bauge Regional Park

Looking around our rented house here in St. Jorioz, I’ve noticed some pretty amazing photos on the walls. Linda did a little sleuthing, and discovered the house is owned by the daughter of the late photographer Ferenc Berko.
Berko is known for, among other things, his photos that make abstractions of scenes that he found in […]

Annecy: 5 walks and a wedding

After early morning exercise (Linda jogged; I did a fairly grueling set of Heidi routines), we set off to explore Annecy’s fabled old town. We figured that if we got there by 10 AM, we’d beat the crowds in a country not particularly known for its early risers, and we’d checked to be sure that […]

Three miles on the shore of Lac d’Annecy

A bicyclist pauses on the shore of Lac d’Annecy this morning as I walked a 3-mile circuit on the lake’s western shore, also known as the ‘Rive Gauche’ hereabouts. A pair of the lake’s celebrated swans or cygnes cruised by, and one of them agreed to pose picturesquely in the reeds (no doubt in the […]

Dinner at St. Jorioz

After the usual airport/airplane/airport/airplane//rental car marathon, we arrived at our rented house in St. Jorioz, above Lake Annecy a couple of hours ago, in time to buy fresh fruit and vegetables at a corner marche, and other staples at the local Champion hypermarche.
So here we are, barely arrived, enjoying bread, cheese wine and a host […]

Exploring the brain, with a Kindle

So, we’re headed off to France, again, this time to a rented house near the town of Annecy, close to France’s Eastern border. Anticipating lots of reading time, I’ve loaded up my Kindle with reading matter, mostly dealing with the structure of the brain and the concept of neuroplasticity. As is usual for our French […]

Reaching out to Creationist kids

Good article in the Sunday NYT about a Florida biology teacher in a conservative district who tries hard to reach kids who come to his class with preconceived notions of Creationism, sometimes groomed by years of teaching by their church. The kids arrive with lists of questions meant to trip up teachers of evolution, and […]

Neuroplasticity

A host of serious neuroscientists and credentialed observers have weighed in recently on the topic of brain plasticity, the notion that The Mind can (physically) change The Brain. Faced with so much on my to-do list, naturally, my response is to plunge into a long-form essay on a completely unrelated topic like neuroplasticity. Unfortunately (or […]

‘Retirement’ is hard work…

True, I’m out of the 9 to 5 rodent marathon, but this doesn’t mean we’re not busy. Indeed, between a strict exercise regimen, meetings with friends and colleagues, trying to find time to read and write and a social calendar that is far more full than in my working days, I’ve barely had time to […]

An ‘Olympic bronze’

So, I’m not in a league with Misty May-Treanor and Kerri Walsh, but my personal Olympics continue. In my world, the bronze equates to walking 2 miles in one hour; the silver is for walking 3 miles in an hour; and the gold is for a return to jogging, if slowly.
This past Saturday, we nabbed […]

Bachelor for a day

So, the spouse is away this weekend with her college roommates in L.A. - something about a limousine, Hollywood types and a girls-only party in Beverly Hills. So, like all red-blooded males, I used the opportunity for the usual guy stuff: I went to church (excellent sermon by Corrie Lassen on the topic of being […]

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