Author Archives
In 2018 I semi-retired by retiring from Weston High School after my 21st year teaching mathematics there. This was also my 44th year as a teacher altogether. In 2023 I retired fully, adding in my 18 years at Harvard’s Crimson Summer Academy each summer. For 21 years I had taught at the Saturday Course in Milton, MA, and I used to serve on the board of the Dorchester Historical Society.
I read, cook, and spend a lot of time building my model railroad. For some reason I’m left with less free time than would be ideal, considering that I’m supposed to be retired, but somehow I also manage to devote time to my wife, Barbara, and to our varying number of cats (once up to six, but now sadly down to one).
Larry Davidson
ljd@larrydavidson.com
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Same Difference (Copperman)
Same Difference is apparently a popular title with contemporary authors (or at least their publishers), as you will conclude if you search for books with that title in various catalogs. The novel by E.J. Copperman is the one being reviewed… Read More ›
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Duck!
Duck and lamb are my two favorite entrées to ask for in restaurants, but most of the time I just don’t find them on menus. Sure, you can usually find duck on a fancy French menu, or lamb on any… Read More ›
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Flicka feels safe, showing off her extra toes in her sideways box.
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“Raise high the roof beam, carpenters.”
As you look at the title of this post, you’re probably thinking of J.D. Salinger’s novella. Or perhaps, if you are of a more classical bent, you’re thinking of Sappho’s fragment #111, which of course I still remember from Greek… Read More ›
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Remember this?
I’ll talk about like nine different things, and they all come back brilliantly together, and it’s like, friends of mine that are, like, English professors, they say, “It’s the most brilliant thing I’ve ever seen.” DJT
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Happy Labor Day!
Today is Labor Day. Remember, as Billy Bragg wrote (and sings), that there is Power in a Union… Not to mention https://youtu.be/wI7ONJ60DIc?si=3-4wk__QSQMWYVcg, but apparently WordPress won’t let me embed two links in the same post. And as Capybara8868 posted on… Read More ›
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For anyone who has had to interact with an INTJ
Found in the INTJ group on Facebook: Interviewer: What is your greatest weakness? Me: Interpreting the semantics of a question but ignoring the pragmatics. Interviewer: Can you give me an example? Me: Yes, I can.
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Fire and Bones
another fine addition to Kathy Reichs’s well-known Bones series. The novel Fire and Bones manages to be both calm and suspenseful at the same time. There’s also a lot of actual history thrown in with the detective fiction. I don’t… Read More ›
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Buck-a-shuck
It was monthly buck-a-shuck at Tavolo yesterday. We went early, which is always a good idea. Barbara had 18 oysters — the first photo below shows just the first 12! — along with focaccia and half of a Kale Caesar… Read More ›
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The challenges and rewards of building a staircase
A 1:87 model staircase, that is, not a lifesize one. When you first came upon the “House under Construction” kit that Meredith and I are using to build our current project, you probably realized how this kit was different from… Read More ›
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Flicka says…
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Dead Land (Sara Paretsky)
For reference here, I will start by quoting from what I wrote five years ago in a review of Sara Paretsky’s Shell Game: If you like Donald Trump, don’t bother reading Shell Game, Sara Paretsky’s newest mystery novel: it will only irritate… Read More ›
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Does English need a better alphabet?
Why, you ask, would we need a better alphabet? Nothing is wrong, you say, with the one we have. We all learned it in kindergarten, after all. I suppose some other alphabets are prettier, so that might entice you; and… Read More ›
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Childless Cat Ladies
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Apparently a book review: What is Château Rock?
Read the book! But read this review first. (I know that some people don’t like to read reviews first, but be assured that you won’t find any spoilers here.) First, though, take this one-question multiple-choice quiz: What do you think… Read More ›
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Two surprising Ancestry conclusions
Capitalization matters. Occasionally. The title of this post can be read as written, with an upper-case “A,” or it can be read as spoken aloud, with a lower-case “a” (not that case choice can easily be heard in speech, though… Read More ›
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The Lola Quartet
“Have you ever made a decision in a moment of panic and then regretted it for the rest of your life?” One of the characters in Emily St. John Mandel’s novel, The Lola Quartet, asks this question near the end… Read More ›
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Why accelerate in math?
Looking back over five decades (more or less) of teaching high-school mathematics, I estimate that maybe 30–40 of the students I have taught over the years were truly accelerated in math. But let’s define our terms first: So, you ask,… Read More ›
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Building a house under construction
Now that my model railroad includes a pre-fab house built from a standard kit, which I showed as a work in progress over ten weeks, it’s time to experiment with a different approach: a compromise between a standard kit and… Read More ›
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Harris/Buttigieg.
Clearly.
Learning Strategies 