Yesterday, I went back to JC Penneys to pick up that store’s third attempt at making my new glasses with progressive lenses.

One of my eyes is slightly higher than the other. Even worse, my “high eye’s” ear is slightly lower than my other ear. You’d never notice either of those things if I didn’t tell you, but they both affect exactly where my eyes look through each of the lenses of my glasses. So the manager of the optical department spent some time custom-fitting my new frames to my face — a task that doesn’t matter much with single-vision lenses, but which is critically important to the success of progressive lenses.

After many small adjustments, [more...]

You receive an email message from a stranger. It contains your name, your address, your telephone number and other personal information.

It says that you (or one of your loved ones) will be kidnapped unless you pay a ransom.

You are given specific instructions for how to pay the ransom.

If you don’t pay it within the specified amount of time, you (or your loved one) will be hurt or killed.

What would you do?

What should you do?

…mate?

Ever since my wife and I moved to the Sunshine State over 4 1/2 years ago, we’ve taken Mini, Pookie, Petey and Max to a wonderful local veterinarian. I had to get used to the fact that his very reserved “bedside manner” belies the fact that he really, really loves the animals for which he cares. He and his staff of vet technicians have always provided our little ones with extremely loving, gentle care — in fact, Max is always very happy to go to the vet’s office, and excitedly wags his tail and gives them kisses every time, even after they give him shots.

During and after our recent loss, they shared our grief and were very supportive, so I wanted to do something to thank them and let them know how much we appreciate them.

So, last week, [more...]

We’ve all heard of “greenhouse gasses,” the carbon-dioxide (CO2) gas that reportedly contributes to global warming.

For years, scientists have been wearing their thinking caps, trying to think of ways to reduce the amount of CO2 gas in the atmosphere. One leading technology involves capturing and burying it. That might sound like a good idea, but only until you realize that any future earthquake could release huge clouds of buried CO2.

Luckily, anyone who remembers their grade-school science lessons knows that most elements can exist as a solid, a liquid or a gas. So now one company has invented a way to convert CO2 into solid “calcium carbonate that can be used in everything from cosmetics to ceramics.”

I’m not a scientist, and I don’t even play one on TV, but that sounds like a good idea to me.

As we used to say in the old days, “Man, It’s a gas.”