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...
by Phil Houseal | Jul 24, 2024 | All Articles, Philosophy
July 24, 2024–Running errands. They are tasks we all dread but can’t avoid, and if we didn’t have them to do, we would miss doing them. “Running errands” is code for everything from dropping off a check so they don’t cut off the power, to the deadbeat dad going out...
by Phil Houseal | Jul 17, 2024 | All Articles, Philosophy
July 17, 2024 “Perfection is achieved not when there’s nothing more to add, but when there’s nothing left to take away.” Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Why do we always focus on adding, instead of subtracting? In all my years of managing programs and...
by Phil Houseal | Jul 10, 2024 | All Articles, History, Philosophy
July 10, 2024–This week I was amazed to learn not everyone grew up with a treehouse in their back yard. A cartoonist online recently wondered why, when every cartoon has pictures of elaborate backyard treehouses, he knew no one in real life who had one. I replied, not...
by Phil Houseal | Jul 3, 2024 | All Articles, Education, Philosophy
July 3, 2024–Making decisions might go smoother if we shaved them using Occam’s Razor. Occam’s Razor is a philosophical rule, which I’ve always understood as the simplest solution is usually the correct one. More accurately stated, Occam’s Razor is “a principle of...
