I couldn’t finish the puzzle today and then I tuned in to Rex’s blog and saw that he rated it “easy.” D’oh! I was done in by two names: Wolfgang PAULI, a Nobel Prize-winning physicist who’s been dead since 1958, and EARL Boykins, the second-shortest-ever NBA player, who stopped playing in 2012. Gimme a break! I demand a recount! Hang Mike Pence!
Wait, what?
Pauli was a helluva physicist. Einstein called him his “spiritual heir.” He was famously a perfectionist and was known as the “conscience of physics.” He could be scathing in his dismissal of any theory he found lacking, often labelling it ganz falsch, “utterly wrong.”
But he reserved his most severe criticism for theories or theses so unclearly presented as to be untestable, and thus not properly belonging within the realm of science, even though posing as such. They were worse than wrong because they could not be proved wrong. Famously, he once said of such a paper: “It is not even wrong!”
I know exactly what he means. The very first semester I taught, I had a student who had no idea what was going on. He got a three on the first test (out of 100). He came to beg for a passing grade and I remember saying that his answers bore no relation to the questions. I said “You would have to improve a lot just the get the questions wrong.” At the time I had no idea that observation was “Paulian.”
Here’s a piece on young love by Laila Hartman-Sigall from Met Diary:
He carried the box while they held each other’s hands, their sweat stuck between warm, tanned palms.
They walked down the cobblestone street, and she kept her heels out of cracks in the ground. New York heat held her neck. It smelled like new deodorant, smoke, like summertime.
She put her head near his ear.
They sat at the bottom of a Brooklyn stoop–the lights were on–and he passed her a slice.
Their elbows touched.
She wiped the corner of his lip and put her leg over his.
He traced constellations between spots of orange oil on her scabby knees.
“It tastes good,” she said.
“The cheese?” he asked with a laugh.
“Yeah.”
He whispered in her ear.
“But we’re on the street,” she said.
“Come on,” he said, and took her hand again.
How many cruciverbalists (crossword solvers) does it take to change a light bulb? ANS: Eleven — six across and five down. (I just made that up — can you tell?)
Sulyhivka is a very small town in Ukraine that had a population of just 50 before Russia invaded. It emptied out when it was occupied and then it was destroyed. It was liberated in September but only two men have come back: Victor Kalyberda, 61, a tractor driver, and Anatolii Solovei, 52, a landowner-farmer. They had a cordial relationship before, but didn’t know each other well.
Victor is staying in a neighbor’s kitchen now (see photo), and Anatolii in a plastic shelter he set up in the ruins of his home. There are no utilities. There is water in the village well, and volunteers drop off food.
As described in the NYT, at least once a day Victor walks to see Anatolii, past the war’s detritus of armored vehicles blasted open and destroyed farm equipment. The overgrown cemetery where both men’s families are buried is littered with small land mines that can blow a person’s foot in half.
Recently, Victor helped move some surviving farm equipment for Anatolii, who plans to start cultivating his fields after clearing the explosives himself.
But often, the two men just sit and drink tea or coffee, saying little.
“What’s there to talk about?” Anatolii asked.
Pianist Andre Watts died on Wednesday in his home in Bloomington, IN. He was 77. I saw him perform twice: once a few years ago with the NJ Symphony, and once decades ago in a seat (not on the lawn), at Tanglewood with the BSO. He died as he wanted to die, from a piano falling on his head. [No he didn’t.]
This beautiful paragraph is from his obit in The Times:
“At the start of the pandemic in 2020, Mr. Watts, who was diagnosed with Stage 4 prostate cancer in 2016, had been planning a feat: He would play Ravel’s Piano Concerto for the Left Hand in a version that he had reworked for the right hand (his left was recovering from a nerve injury). As he practiced on his twin Yamaha pianos, he got daily inspiration from a one-legged starling that emerged outside his home in Bloomington.”
Alas, health problems and the pandemic prevented the performance and he mostly stopped playing the piano, though he continued to work with students.
He is survived by his wife Joan Brand Watts, two step-children, and seven step-grandchildren. Mrs. Watts said of him:
“Music was how he endured and how he survived. When he actually played, then he was happy. It just really lifted up his soul.”
He described music as a sacred space in which he felt he could breathe and flourish. “Your relationship with your music is the most important thing that you have, and it is, in the sense of private and sacred, something that you need to protect,” he said before a concert in Baltimore in 2012. “The dross of everyday life is very, very powerful and very strong. So you need to protect your special relationship with your music.”
I get it, Brother — rest in peace.
Whenever I get blood taken these days, I ask the phlebotomist if I’ll be able to play the piano afterwards. They always say “Sure,” and I say, “but I couldn’t play it before.” My funniest blood test was by a big Black guy. He took the needle, approached me with it, broke into a big smile, and said “This is my first time!” I was flattered he could tell I would love it, and I did.
Remember Boris and Natasha from the Bullwinkle show? The puzzle wanted us to remember Natasha’s last name (I didn’t). It was FATALE. (Boris’s was Badenov, which is pretty funny as a play on composer Boris Godunov.)
And here’s a cute clue/answer: “What might be said by successful bettors … or sesame seeds?” Answer” “We’re on a roll.”
This was a WOE (what on earth?): “Plant genus named after the Greek goddess of nature.” Answer: ARTEMISIA. Fuhgeddaboutit, right? And from Owl Chatter’s Dirty Old Man Dept., I was hoping “Brand name associated with cups” had something to do with bras. But it was REESES. Boo.
Oy, that’s more than enough nonsense for one day. Thanks for popping in.
The Wellington Files 