by Phil Houseal | Oct 2, 2024 | All Articles, Education, History, Philosophy
Oct 2, 2024–Do you know anyone who shies away from going to parties and public events? Maybe you consider them to be aloof or distant. They seem not to be interested in spending time with anyone. They forsake parties, avoid luncheons, never go to movies or backyard...
by Phil Houseal | Sep 25, 2024 | All Articles, Education, Philosophy
Sept 25, 2024–In the 1980s I brainstormed the idea of harnessing the energy of “people walking around” by installing turnstyles on the sidewalks of New York. My theory was that the small bursts of energy generated by people pushing through narrow openings would create...
by Phil Houseal | Sep 18, 2024 | All Articles, Education, History, Philosophy
Sept 18, 2024–Don’t walk under a ladder. Don’t let a black cat cross your path. Knock on wood. Step on a crack; break your mother’s back. We’ve all heard these and other superstitions since we were in grade school. They sound childish and were the source of harmless...
by Phil Houseal | Sep 11, 2024 | All Articles, History, Philosophy
Sept 11, 2024–Have you written your obituary? Believe it or not, that was an assignment I gave to my 6th grade gifted students. The point was to nudge them to think about how they hoped to use the gifts they possessed over their lifetimes, to not take them for...
by Phil Houseal | Sep 4, 2024 | All Articles, Philosophy
Sept 4, 2024–My latest favorite throne tome is Words on Words, a 1980 book by John Bremner that explores words and explains their usage in an irreverent manner. What I like about it is that it presents common words that we think we know, but that we don’t really know,...
by Phil Houseal | Aug 28, 2024 | All Articles, History, Philosophy
Aug 28, 2024–Someone proposed we start a religious sect called the New Amish, emulating those sons of Menno whose followers in America effectively froze all progress at the random date of 1878. Why not do the same 100 years on? I grew up among Amish and Mennonite...
by Phil Houseal | Aug 21, 2024 | All Articles, Education, People of the Hill Country, Philosophy
Aug 21, 2024–Name as many animals as you can, in one minute. Congratulations, you just helped researchers calibrate a digital test for brain health. Recently I set an appointment to help Austin-based BrainCheck conduct such a research study. A polite gentleman...
by Phil Houseal | Aug 14, 2024 | All Articles, History, Philosophy
Aug 14, 2023–I used to wonder why TV’s Jeopardy had a Potpourri column. I now realize it was simply a place for the writing staff to dump all the question/answers that didn’t fit under one heading. Ergo… ### I’m convinced our gardens are more productive when we...
by Phil Houseal | Aug 7, 2024 | All Articles, Education, History, Philosophy
Aug 7, 2024–The first time more than two cavemen got together to go hunting, one of them stepped up and said, “Here are the rules.” Only it sounded like, “Ug, oomba dooga. sheboygan.” Every meeting ever held since that time, has started with someone reciting the rules...
by Phil Houseal | Jul 31, 2024 | All Articles, Philosophy
July 31, 2024–When I first became a director and was trying to navigate the power structure, a veteran pulled me aside and said, Phil, administrators are just like dogs; they roam around and mark their turf. Of course, she used a more colorful euphemism for “marking...
