Determining the charge of an electron

 "Take the shortest route, the one that nature planned - to speak and act in the healthiest way.  Do that, and be free of pain and stress, free of all calculation and pretension." - Marcus Aurelius

Intermittent posting for a while

 "Ambition means tying your well-being to what others say or do.  Self-indulgence means tying it to the things that happen to you.  Sanity mans tying it to your own actions." - Marcus Aurelius

I don't give financial advice, but...

... I don't give financial advice!  I also don't have a financial degree.  You are on your own financially - as in all things.  Most importantly, don't attempt to hold me responsible for your own actions.  Only a fool would act based on some random guy's blog posts!

Navigating through a dark time

James Stockdale, on his 7 years as a POW of North Vietnam, in the "Hanoi Hilton".

Q: "Who didn't make it out?"

A: "Oh, that's easy.  The optimists"

Q: "The optimists?  I don't understand."

 A: "The optimists.  Oh, they were the ones who said, "We're going to be out by Christmas."  And Christmas would come and Christmas would go.  Then they'd say "We're going to be out by Easter." And Easter would come and Easter would go.  And then Thanksgiving and then it would be Christmas again.  And they died of a broken heart"

Long Philosophical Post

This is not my normal type of post.  I try to avoid social or political commentary, but I think unusual times deserve unusual responses.  As I write this post, we are at the beginning of a global pandemic that's keeping most of the world under a no-travel advisory, or "lock-down".

Below:  Playing chess with Death during the Black Plague - a scene from "The Seventh Seal"