My Blog
Teaching Tales: A Challenge
The Sadistic Teacher “Class, give me your attention. For this part of the lab, you’ll be studying osmosis by observing water uptake by raisins. First, weigh a raisin while dry, then soak it in distilled water for 2 hours. Weigh it again and record the weight gain. At...
Thanksgiving Giggles
It's Thanksgiving, the day when families around America gather to enjoy each other’s company, feast on turkey, and maybe, like us, add a few more stories to their repertoire. Here follows a few of my favorite Thanksgiving stories. They may not have been funny at the...
Podcast Pilgrimage
If you're my age, you'll remember a hilarious commercial for Alka Seltzer where a man is being told, Try it, you'll like it," repeatedly, until he does. His response after tasting the food is, "I thought I was gonna die." Try it! Well, a year or so ago, my friend told...
Teaching Tales: My Amazing Students
A Variety of Students On the first day of the fall cell biology class at NVCC, my attention was drawn to a bright-eyed, attractive Persian student, Neshat. Seated in the front of the class, she nodded in comprehension when a concept registered, smiled at my jokes, and...
Teaching Tales: Collegial Advice
It was my second semester at NVCC, and I’d been assigned Bio 102. Full of enthusiasm, I wanted to be the best college professor I could be. I pored over the course objectives for Bio 102 and the list of chapters to be covered: zoology, botany, and ecology. “Wow,...
Fleeting Pleasures
Currently, I spend a lot of time gazing at trees. If I could suck the beauty of the leaves deep into my soul, I would. Instead, I take photos in a vain attempt to capture what I’m seeing. The pictures are nice, but they’re not the same. I also spend time listening to...