students put his boots on?
He asked for help and she could see why. With her pulling and him
pushing, the boots still didn't want to go on. When the second boot was
finally on, she had worked up quite a sweat.
She almost whimpered when the little boy said, "Teacher, they're on the
wrong feet." She looked and sure enough, they were.
It wasn't any easier pulling the boots off than it was putting them
on. She managed to keep her cool as together they worked to get the
boots back on-- this time on the right feet.
He then announced, "These aren't my boots."
She bit her tongue rather than get right in his face and scream, "Why
didn't you say so?" like she wanted to. Once again she struggled to help
him pull the ill-fitting boots off.
He then said, "They're my brother's boots. My Mom made me wear them."
She didn't know if she should laugh or cry. She mustered up the grace to
wrestle the boots onto his feet again. Finally that task was
accomplished and she asked him, "Now, where are your mittens?"
He said, "I stuffed them in the toes of my boots..."
GRAND PRIZE WINNER of a West Coast (of course) Radio Station Contest for Listeners' Impromptu Theories
Subject: Perpetual Motion
When a cat is dropped, it always lands on its feet, and when toast is dropped, it always lands buttered side down. If giant slabs of hot buttered toast are strapped to the backs of a hundred tethered cats, the two opposing forces will cause the cats to hover, spinning inches above the ground. Using the giant buttered toast/cat array, a high-speed monorail could easily link New York with Chicago.
The story behind the following: There's a nutball who supposedly really exists. In his spare time, he digs things out of his back yard and sends the stuff he finds to the Smithsonian Institute. He labels them with scientific names, insisting that they are actual archeological finds. Here's a letter from the Smithsonian from when he sent them a Barbie doll head.
Paleoanthropology Division
Smithsonian Institute
207 Pennsylvania Avenue
Washington, DC 20078
Dear Sir:
Thank you for your latest submission to the Institute, labeled
"211-D, layer seven, next to the clothesline post. Hominid skull."
We have given this specimen a careful and detailed examination,
and regret to inform you that we disagree with your theory that
it represents "conclusive proof of the presence of Early Man in
Charleston County two million years ago." Rather, it appears that
what you have found is the head of a Barbie doll, of the variety
one of our staff, who has small children, believes to be the "Malibu
Barbie".
It is evident that you have given a great deal of thought to the
analysis of this specimen, and you may be quite certain that those
of us who are familiar with your prior work in the field were
loathe to come to contradiction with your findings. However, we
do feel that there are a number of physical attributes of the
specimen which might have tipped you off to its modern origin:
1. The material is molded plastic. Ancient hominid remains are
typically fossilized bone.
2. The cranial capacity of the specimen is approximately 9 cubic
centimeters, well below the threshold of even the earliest identified
proto-hominids.
3. The dentition pattern evident on the "skull" is more consistent
with the common domesticated dog than it is with the "ravenous
man-eating Pliocene clams" you speculate roamed the wetlands during
that time.
This latter finding is certainly one of the most intriguing hypotheses
you have submitted in your history with this institution, but
the evidence seems to weigh rather heavily against it. Without
going into too much detail, let us say that:
A. The specimen looks like the head of a Barbie doll that a dog
has chewed on.
B. Clams don't have teeth.
It is with feelings tinged with melancholy that we must deny your
request to have the specimen carbon dated. This is partially due
to the heavy load our lab must bear in its normal operation, and
partly due to carbon dating's notorious inaccuracy in fossils
of recent geologic record. To the best of our knowledge, no Barbie
dolls were produced prior to 1956 AD, and carbon dating is likely
to produce wildly inaccurate results.
Sadly, we must also deny your request that we approach the National
Science Foundation's Hylogeny Department with the concept of assigning
your specimen the scientific name "Australopithecus Spiff-Arino."
Speaking personally, I, for one, fought tenaciously for the acceptance
of your proposed taxonomy, but was ultimately voted down because
the species name you selelcted was hyphenated, and didn't really
sound like it might be Latin.
However, we gladly accept your generous donation of this fascinating
specimen to the musem. While it is undoubtedly not a hominid fossil,
it is, nonetheless, yet another riveting example of the great
body of work you seem to accumulate here so effortlessly. You
should know that our Director has reserved a special shelf in
his own office for the display of the specimens you have previously
submitted to the Institution, and the entire staff speculates
daily on what you will happen upon next in your digs at the site
you have discovered in your backyard. We eagerly anticipate your
trip to our nation's capital that you proposed in your last letter,
and several of us are pressing the Director to pay for it. We
are particularly interested in hearing you expand on your theories
surrounding the "trans-positating fillifitation of ferrous ions
in a structural matrix" that makes the excellent juvenile Tyrannosaurus
rex femur you recently discovered take on the deceptive appearance
of a rusty 9-mm Sears Craftsman automotive crescent wrench.
Yours in Science,
Harvey Rowe
Curator, Antiquities
