"You know, we're living in a society!"

Over the last two semesters I have been participating in two seminar classes offered within the Center for Microelectronics & Photonics at the University of Arkansas. The center offers interdisciplinary graduate degrees, and I have gotten to know the first and second year students in the program pretty well by going to these seminars. The most intriguing class thus far was the discussion of the responsibilities of a scientist or engineer in the society at large. Here is the essence of the question that started the discussion: Do we as technologists have an "extra" duty to society because of our training and talents? Or, said another way, what do we "owe" society based on our talents, education and employment opportunities?

As you might guess, the first comments by the students were something like, "We should give back to society because of our successes." When I heard this, I saw an opportunity to challenge this notion that has become conventional wisdom. In reality, these extremely bright students had not been GIVEN anything. They had to EARN their degrees and admission to graduate schools, and later, when they apply for jobs they will EARN a salary. It won't be GIVEN to them out of the goodness of the employers heart.

So, I simply asked what does it mean to live in society and what giving back actually means. When I asked the question, I was thinking of Ayn Rand's Objectivism philosophy, "Man - every man - is an end in himself, not the means to the ends of others. He must exist for his own sake, neither sacrificing himself to others nor sacrificing others to himself." Rand put forth the idea (in Atlas Shrugged) that creators of intellectual property more than pay their way in society by their innovations. Essentially, she would say that the idea of "giving back" is fallacious because the intellectual labor of creators gives value to society well beyond what the creator can utilize.

I am drawn to the another Objectist idea that men should deal with one another by voluntary free exchange with mutual benefit. That is why I want to scream when someone says, "That house is too big," or "You shouldn't drive an SUV." How someone chooses to spend their money should be of no concern to anyone else unless it is illegal. Only a collectivist (socialist, communist, or fascist) believes that it is his right to tell his neighbor how to spend his money. Although my relationship with the Creator tells me that much is expected from whom much (money, talent, etc.) is given, I don't believe that I have the right to force that view on my neighbor.

To this day, this is the only discussion that has continued for some time after class. That is noteworthy because the class ends at 4:30 on Friday afternoon in a college town. I think the reason for this is because Rand's views of society are in such conflict with the prevailing "wisdom" of our society. Hopefully, the next time someone screams at these students "You know, we're living in a society. We're supposed to act in a civilized way!" the response will be "Who is John Galt?"

"But where does the HEAT go?"

I was reminded of a scene from Seinfeld when I read this article on the missing heat of global warming. The scene is one where Kramer and Elaine are sitting in the hallway of Elaine's building. Elaine asks to borrow Kramer's deli slicer and Kramer doesn't want to part with it. After Elaine demonstrates that she has sufficient knowledge to use the darn thing, Kramer frustratedly asks, "But where does the MEAT go?"

Why does the article remind me of this? Well, other than the fact that I can typically relate any life situation back to Seinfeld, I can just hear the Josh Willis (JPL), Kevin Trenberth (NCAR), or pick your favorite global warming believer at NASA saying in fit of frustration, "But where does the HEAT go?" So, I thought I would give them at least three plausible explanations: (1) The heat doesn't exist; (2) The heat is being radiated to space and is of no consequence; or (3) The heat trapped by carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases is so small it can't be detected by our crude instruments and is of no consequence.

I have asked myself why this article hacked me off so much, and I finally decided that it is the fact that the theory of anthrogenic global warming (AGW) was being treated in this article like it belongs in the big leagues with the Law of Conservation of Energy and the Law of Conservation of Angular Momentum. You can put your trust in these two laws, but I wouldn't bet my Diet Coke much less my farm on AGW.

Let me give you an example. Back in 1911, Lise Meitner and Otto Hahn found that when a radioactive sample undergoes beta decay, the electron that is emitted can have any energy up to some maximum value and that the angular momentum of the reaction didn't add up. Big deal, right? RIGHT! The first item violates the Law of Conservation of Energy, and the second item violates the Law of Conservation of Angular Momentum. Well, this caused a stir until 1930 when Wolfgang Pauli postulated that another particle that we didn't have the technology to detect was emitted along with the electron and this invisible particle carried away the right amount of energy and angular momentum. In 1934, Enrico Fermi (my favorite physicist) wrote the paper that forms the basis for our current understanding of the beta decay process and called that particle a neutrino. A neutrino wasn't physically detected until 1956, but we KNEW neutrinos were there because we could trust these two laws.

Here is the part that really gets me about the article, not only does the ocean not have the extra heat to warm it up that it must have for AGW to be true, the ocean temperatures have cooled since 2003 (but according to the article, that isn't really significant). This means that the oceans are not even getting the heat that they are supposed to get to keep a constant temperature. They cannot even get the DIRECTION of the temperature change right!!!

So, let me get this straight. You can't do the energy balance calculations close enough to get the temperature change to go in the right direction, but you want me to trust you that there is some mysterious missing AGW heat out there that we haven't found.

Here is my final explanation for the location of the missing heat. It is in the same place where you guys keep the $20+ billion dollars of hard earned taxes spent on the AGW modeling boondoggle. Vanished, like the proverbial fart in the wind.

"Who Doesn't Want to Wear the Ribbon!"

Over the years I have been amazed at the absolutely meaningless gestures that people will go through to prove that they care about something. Many of you will recognize the post title from Kramer's run-in with some "street toughs" over his refusal to wear an AIDS awareness ribbon.



I guess everyone on the planet except me knows that having more ribbons on your lapel than Patton means that you care more about the rain forest, AIDS research, breast cancer, etc. than someone who doesn't wear them. Somehow this makes sense. Which brings me to what has many jazzed today, Earth Hour.

In case you don't know (I didn't until this morning), Earth Hour is a ritual that the inventors of Earth Day have brought us this year. Next Saturday (March 29) between 8 and 9 pm, we are supposed to power down "non-essential" electrical appliance and turn off all of our lights to show that we care about energy conservation and reducing our carbon footprint. Basically, the idea is to produce a voluntary blackout for an hour to reflect on the evilness of our comfortable but very energy intensive lifestyle. Jay Currie has a very different idea.

I have never read his blog before today, but from this post I get the idea that he is just about as tired of empty gestures as I am. He has decided to "Just Say No!" by keeping his lights on (ALL of them) during Earth Hour. I get confused on the inspiration for the idea but Tim Blair has planned an Illumination Hour on March 29 between 8 and 9 pm. As my buddy Chip would say, "What are the odds?" A couple of Tim's dedicated readers have decided to take it a step further and have a Carbon Party.

That is my kind of activism. During their HOUR OF POWER, it sounds like they plan on some sort of steel cage death match between the AC unit and the furnace with the winner getting to dominate the household environment for an hour. They also plan to run their vehicles, all electronic equipment, oven, and the washer and dryer. The hope is that they will consume enough electricity during the hour to more than offset any conservation accomplished during the Earth Hour.

If you're interested in becoming part of Illumination Hour to make a mockery of according to Samantha Burns, "Earth Hour stupidity, and all it represents," then visit her web page and sign the official online petition. If you don't have the activist, petition-signing bent, just forget what your Dad always told you for an hour and leave the light on when you leave a room this Saturday night.

Or better yet, you could call Motel 6 and ask them to keep several lights on for you.

The Problem of Choice (Making Assumptions)

One of my all-time favorite professors once told our class, "ALL models are wrong, but some are useful." He was basically letting us know that as scientists and engineers we are going to rely on models to do our jobs, but we couldn't let the model muddy up what we could measure or observe. The Bohr (or shell) model of the atom is an example of a model that is clearly wrong but extremely useful. This is the model of the atom that you may remember from your high school chemistry class. Many of the problems in high school chemistry, Chemistry 101, and Chemistry 102 can be explained by falling back to the shell model for the electrons circling the nucleus of the atom, but the quantum mechanical description of particle wave functions (and their associated probability density functions) are much more reflective of the true situation at the atomic level.

Besides letting us know that the models themselves could prevent a full understanding of a problem, there was a second pitfall that he wanted to let us know about. This pitfall was the fact that when we choose a particular model to analyze a problem that we inherit all the assumptions built in to the model. This poses a serious problem when the analyst doesn't know or understand the assumptions that are built into the model. It can have a serious impact on the usefulness of any results that come from using the model.

Let's take a short trip back to 1922 to examine the havoc that a model choice can create when an entire field of study allows its assumptions to go unexamined. You remember 1922, right? Here is a quick summary: Prohibition, Al Capone, a HUGE lack of computers, and you had to solve extremely complex differential equations by hand. Well, because like every one else, physicists are lazy, this often caused them to look for short cuts (or assumptions) to simplify solving these tough problems. In most cases, the assumptions we are still taught to make (as of 12 years ago) for solving these problems will yield solutions that match reality quite well.

That brings us back to what happened in 1922. Arthur Milne, a fairly distinguished mathematician and physicist, was working out some of the differential equations for the greenhouse effect. He reached a point in solving the problem that required that the boundary conditions be satisfied, and he assumed an "infinitely thick" atmosphere to make the problem easier. While it is not clear whether or not he had been drinking in spite of Prohibition or if Al Capone ordered him to assume an infinitely thick atmosphere, one thing that is very clear is that all of the global circulation models (GCMs) and other climate models use this assumption with one exception. The one exception is the climate model produced by Ferenc Miskolczi. Miskolczi had noticed the assumption in a series of equations and decided to follow the road less traveled. For all you hippies out there, he questioned the assumptions.

What was the result? A new term popped out in the solution to the differential equations. This new term showed that "runaway" global warming is not physically possible because it contradicts the energy balance equations and models that show runaway temperatures are not reliable. Another result was that Miskolczi had to resign his position at NASA in protest because NASA would not allow his work to be published. His work was finally published and here is an excerpt from his abstract, "The long standing misinterpretation of the classic semi-infinite Eddington solution has been resolved. Compared to the semi-infinite model the finite semi-transparent model predicts much smaller ground surface temperature and a larger surface air temperature. The new equation proves that the classic solution significantly overestimates the sensitivity of greenhouse forcing to optical depth perturbations."

Miskolczi has received some vindication in the last couple of years as research from Brookhaven National Laboratory has presented statistical evidence that the earth's response to carbon dioxide is greatly overestimate. Anyway, I guess that assumptions can make an ass out of more than just you and me.

A Nuclear Engineer's View of Validation

As a nuclear engineer, I use radiation physics codes quite a bit. We use the computer software to model radiation effects experiments, to perform reactor safety calculations, and to complete nuclear criticality safety analysis. For us, the regulatory framework that we operate in requires that we validate the software thoroughly. By validation, I mean we compare the computer modeling results with a real world measurement of those results. In fact, the radiation transport and nuclear physics communities have performed many experiments using simple physical geometries and well-known material compositions designed to be modeled exactly by our computer codes. These are known as benchmark experiments, and I have performed both reactor benchmark experiments and code calculations for comparisons (link).

These comparisons are quite rigorous and quantitative. For instance, our transport codes will predict the benchmark experiments to less than 1% difference for the neutron multiplication factor. When we predict things like radiation doses and particles crossing certain boundaries, we generally don't do quite as well. Those quantities are usually predicted to within 5-20% depending on the complexity of the benchmark. These results allow us to use our software with confidence for problems that are similar in scope (same energy region, similar materials, etc.) to the benchmarks because we have demonstrated that the software code has the appropriate physics and material models.

So, here is excerpt from the abstract of an article: "Using quantitative proxy models of peat and bauxite formation, based upon modern analogues, predictions of the distribution of peats (coals) and bauxites for both the Late Jurassic (Kimmeridgian) and midCretaceous (Cenomanian) have been made using a General Circulation Model (GCM)." After saying to myself, "That's a load of BS!", I decided to write down why this is such a poor way to do computer modeling and why this is NOT validation.

Here is a clause by clause translation of the abstract from BS-ese to English:

• "Using quantitative proxy models of peat and bauxite formation ..." --> I took numbers from somebody's (another graduate student in my research group) model of peat and bauxite formation. I won't tell you where the numbers came from or how that model was constructed because the graduate student is a computer science major and knows absolutely nothing about geology.

• "..., based upon modern analogues, ..." --> We really don't know how these formations develop, we can't observe their formation happening anywhere today, but my collaborator at another university has a guess at something that supports my argument in this paper. Most people will just read right past this clause anyway.

• "...predictions of the distribution of peats (coals) and bauxites for both the Late Jurassic (Kimmeridgian) and midCretaceous (Cenomanian) have been made using a General Circulation Model (GCM)." --> I know we use GCMs to model the atmosphere and oceans and make wild guesses about climate, but I am going to show you where to find coal and aluminum ore using these magic codes. If you bought the load in the first couple of clauses, I bet that I can sell you the even bigger load to finish the sentence.
  

After reading the abstract, I decided not to finish the article. I did read on to find the funding source for the research. This load was funded by the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). The NERC makes this claim on their homepage, "NERC funds world-class science in universities and our own research centres that increases knowledge and understanding of the natural world."

I will definitely admit to a general bias against climate models because I am unsure how much of what they do is truly science as opposed to computer science. For the sake of discussion, let's say that it is. Will someone please tell me the "world class" aspect of this paper? I KNOW that Sandia does world class science and engineering (examples), so I am pretty sure that I would recognize when something is in that category. If a co-worker brought this to me at Sandia as part of our internal peer review, it would get a "Not Recommended for Publication" rating. Saying this in another way, the article is well below the minimum information (science quota) that I would recommend for publication and is contributing to the decrease that I mentioned in For Starters. The sad thing is that the authors now have this article as a peer-reviewed publication (in the Journal of the Geological Society) on their CVs.

In summary, this article is NOT validation of any kind because the results are never compared to something that we can physically measure. At best, this is a verification that the modeling team writing the article has the same general physics models in their computer software as another computer code that models coal and aluminum ore formation. This is a good example of what Steven Milloy calls "PlayStation Climatology."

To those of you who know me well enough to have pushed my global warming button, I hope that this post on the subject provides an insight into my cynicism or lack of concern about the dire predictions that surface every few days. I don't want to put our collective economic futures in the hands of people that do "science" in this way. I am going to end with a note to Walt and Annie. I think that this is the type of stuff that you guys wanted me to write about. If it's not, leave me a comment and tell me where I went astray and suggestions for other posts.

For Starters or "On the 101 Things About Me"

For Starters
I am sitting here contemplating why my sister-in-law would tell me at dinner, "Russell, you really should write a blog. Lots of people would read it." As I write this, I can't believe anyone other than family and friends will ever want to read it (and it is a real stretch to believe that my family and friends would want to read it). UNLESS, it is some trick by Annie to find some new reason for Walt to make fun of me and laugh at my expense. Actually, I am fairly positive that is THE reason for the encouragement, and there is no real trick.

However, there have been several things that I have wanted to write (really scream) about for a while. The title of this blog "Minimum Publishable Unit (MPU)" is just one example. What is this MPU thing? It is the minimum level of new information in a newspaper article, magazine article, journal article, or blog entry that is allowed to be published by the organization (and this can definitely be a single person) responsible for the content of the publication. Because I will eventually be responsible for "publishing" this blog entry to the world, it is pretty clear that I will become part of the problem that you may find me complaining about here.

I know you are asking yourself, "Self, just what is this problem he is talking about?" Well, the MPU seems to be shrinking to absolutely ZERO new information in peer reviewed research journals and many other forums. While I understand that you can reach a trend toward zero that doesn't actually become zero until after the sun stops burning (or an asymptotic approach to zero for you math geeks out there like me), I have recently read some articles that made me feel like the sum of my knowledge had decreased after reading them. I actually told someone (I think it was my manager) recently, "If the trend doesn't change soon, a complete journal article will become a title and list of authors. That's it! AND, the authors, all 72 of them, will use that article in their attempt to get tenure at their universities!" Now that I think about it, it was my manager, and he mentioned that I should calm down just a bit because I probably didn't want to raise my blood pressure any more.

So, as you can see, there are things that I would like to write about. This blog-thing seems like the sort of place where I can rant and rave like a lunatic on these things. It will likely give my family and friends interesting fodder for ridicule when we see each other. And, maybe if I include enough new information in every blog entry, I can change the disturbing trend that I see in the MPU.


On the 101 Things About Me
For some reason, most of the blogs that I have seen have this linked item "101 Things About Me." It seemed like a really good idea to me when I first saw it, but I really started thinking about it. I am not real sure that there are that many (101) things about me because I am pretty basic. Even with that pessimistic outlook, I decided to give it a try. Likely, as you read this, there will be fewer than 101 things, but I will add to it until I reach 101 items sometime around June 18, 2025.

1. I have no idea how I ended up with a PhD in nuclear engineering. Growing up, I don't think I even met a single PhD until I visited colleges my senior year of high school. If you had asked me in high school what I planned to do after graduation, the response would have been something like, "Uh, I don't know. Maybe I'll be a chemical engineer like my Uncle Buck. Or, maybe I'll go to medical school to be a doctor." What I really wanted to be was a professional baseball player.

2. I really enjoy working for Sandia National Laboratories. There is almost always an interesting challenging project that I am working on. There are drawbacks though. I usually can't talk to my family or friends about whatever fun interesting project that I am working on. The "How was your day, dear?" conversation with Kristy at the end of the day is usually pretty basic. "Fine" is often about all I can allow.

3. I have an Uncle Buck. Since the John Candy movie came out in 1989, that fact usually gives people a chuckle. He is chemical engineer that specializes in petroleum products and pipelines. He also is in and out of "retirement" on a regular basis. As a side note on this item, this 101 things might be easier than I thought. In another side note, John Candy's character is Buck Russell (weird, huh).

4. I am a very avid reader. At any given time, I might have 2-4 books going so that I can change to a different subject if I feel like it. I also keep a list of the books that I have finished.

5. I have a younger sister and 2 younger brothers. Amanda is now a great stay-at-home mom who has dabbled in real estate sales and appraisals among other careers. I am pretty sure that she hated me through school because we shared lots of teachers, and she didn't like being my little sister. Of all things that could do it, NASCAR has brought us closer together. Adam is an assistant football coach/math & technology teacher (I know, that is kind of a contradiction). He has allowed me sneek peeks into the life of a high school football coach, and I can honestly say that it is a fun job for an evening. I don't think I have the personality for it as a full-time profession. He really likes to talk about whatever sport (usually associated with the Arkansas Razorbacks) that is in season. Lee is still in high school. He caused quite a stir when my mom and step-dad adopted him during my junior year of high school. After he showed up at his first basketball game at 3 days-old, there were rumors around the high school and town that he was my son instead of my brother. The speed, power, and quickness of a small town rumor mill compares favorably with Darren McFadden.

6. Everyone in my wife's family has a nickname given by her Poppy. My nickname was originally "Baby" because she is a LOT older than me. I have been upgraded to "Dr. Baby" since I finished at Texas A&M.

7. Metatarsalgia, Hypertension, Gout, GERD. No, this is a not discussion with your grandmother. It is a list of the medical problems that have surface in the discussions with my doctors over the last couple of years. I am way too young to have a list of ailments that sounds this darn old.

8. I am terrible about staying in touch with friends and family. It is not that I don't want to know what is going on. It sometimes just doesn't occur to me to call or write. My 2007 New Year's Resolution was to do much better in this. I have placed a reminder in my calendar to pop-up each Wednesday morning. So, Brad, Kevin, Robert, Lars, Nick, and Kalin (all friends from Hendrix College) usually have an email in their inbox by Wednesday afternoon each week. I feel like I know what is going on with them for the first time since I graduated in 1996. To keep in better contact with my brothers and sister, I started a NASCAR fantasy owner contest. They have to call me to give me their drivers before each race because I am the commissioner (and I rule with an iron fist).

9. I have to travel a lot now that I am a telecommuter. However, I typically don't actually sleep in hotel rooms. There is just something about a small room with just me in it that prevents me from going to sleep. I usually stare at the ESPN SportCenter repeat thinking, "I really should be asleep now, and if I fall asleep NOW! I will get 4 hours of sleep." After a week on the road, I return home as a zombie. The average good night sleep in a hotel room for me is about 5 hours.

10. I love the smell that fills the house when Kristy is making fajitas. I think that smell should be bottled and sold as perfumes and air fresheners. That's a million dollar idea right there!

11. I have one of the coolest jobs in the world. Basically, I get to intentionally do things with reactors that the Navy says that you should NEVER do even accidently (take them super prompt critical). I work for weeks/months to prepare for experiments that lasts around 10 milliseconds, and it looks like this. That is a picture of the Annular Core Research Reactor at Sandia at some significant power level. I couldn't find any open source videos of the reactor going from 1 kilowatt to 35,000 megawatts in 7 milliseconds. If I find one on the internet, I will post it.

12. Did you know that there is more than one way to get a separated shoulder? I learned this the hard way playing football during my senior year of high school. The first way is to suffer a blunt force directly to the shoulder forcing the ligaments that hold the shoulder together to stretch or separate. That lesson was courtesy of a defensive tackle's helmet from Nashville. The second, and more painful way, involves landing from a fall in such a way that the humerus bone is driven into the socket with enough force to stretch those ligaments. I have a middle linebacker from Ozark to thank for that educational moment. I am sure that there are "real doctors" (as Sophie calls them) out there who will know more ways to accomplish an AC separation. If there are more ways, I want to learn them from a textbook.

13. I THINK I really like teaching. My experience with this is limited to tutoring some math & science, mentoring summer student interns, and conducting training sessions on a computer code that I help develop, but I don't think I am terrible at it. I think I will get a chance to teach a college course in the next year. That experience should let me know whether I really like it or not.

14. I am just slightly afraid of heights. Actually being high above things (like inside a building with regular windows) doesn't bother me. It is when I am high above things in an area that has a small rail or fence to prevent falls that really scares me. I am sure that I embarrassed my dad and sister when I didn't want to stay on the observation tower in Six Flags. All that separates you from death on that the thing is a chain link fence, and I wanted down on the elevator off the tower as fast as possible. I don't remember crying, but I think I wanted to.

15. I have always been a horrible loser. You can ask Joey Emerson about it. Joey was a couple of years older and lived down the street from us when I was between 4 and 9. He would play baseball, whiffleball, and football against me while Dad was "all-time pitcher" or "all-time QB." In the younger years (4-6) of this time span, I would have a crying fit when he would beat me which was almost every time. At some point, Joey and Dad got together and agreed that Joey would let me win to save these scenes that I would create after every loss. Before we ended up moving, Joey and I would compete pretty evenly and I could lose without the fits, but I always (and still do) hated to lose.

16. I watched the original "Invasion of the Body Snatchers" movie at Joey Emerson's house when I was about 8 years old. It was the first scary movie that I had ever seen. Afterwards, I didn't sleep for about 5 straight days. Every time I would start to dose off, I would remember that I was going to turn into one of the pod people. That has to be the scariest movie ever made.

17. I believe that I have a solid claim to having the worst college roommate ever during my freshman year at Hendrix College. The first night (actually it was about 3 am) in the dorm, Josh hurled from his bunk that was 6 feet up in the air. Apparently, it was too much effort to climb out of bed and make it to the bathroom, so he just let 'er launch. Things went downhill from there.

18. On the other hand, the next year I had one of the best college roommates ever. Rob was easy to get along with, we had similar schedules, and we watched women's bowling every Sunday night (it was the only thing on ESPN). After Josh, I think that anyone would have been an upgrade, but it would have been very hard to find a better roommate than Rob.

19. I have basically memorized every episode of Seinfeld. I believe that it was Rob, Brad, Kevin, and Lars that got me hooked on the show, so I blame them for the fact that I can recognize an episode from about the second line of dialogue. With that said, I probably haven't watched a full episode in about 2 years.

20. I have donated plasma hundreds of times in my life with a total money made in the thousands. Through this process I found out that I have a high titer of RSV antibodies in my plasma (I have special blood) and that you get a "fat" bonus if you weigh more than 175 pounds.

21. I absolutely HATE the feeling of dirty socks. If I worn a pair of socks for at least 2 seconds and take them off, then I have to get a clean pair. I don't know if this is hereditary or if I just have really sweaty feet. However, I do know that I pack a lot of socks when I go on a trip (at least double the number that most people need).

22. You might think this is contradictory to what my profession implies (engineers are assumed to be linear thinkers), but as it turns out, I have lots of random thoughts. You will probably see evidence of this on this blog.

23. As a little kid I had lots of ideas for inventions. I would tell my mom about them and she would say something like, "That's a good idea. Go back outside and play." I should have spent more time with a patent lawyer and less time with Joey because I have seen several of my ideas being sold by Ron Popeil late at night.

24. At one time in my life, I was deathly afraid of public speaking. I had to speak at my high school graduation. My really good friend suggested we do the speech together and it made the experience much better. During the ceremony, she sounded like the regular valedictorian while I sounded like the "special" valedictorian. Luckily, I no longer break out into cold sweats and almost faint before I speak to large crowds.

25. If I could get paid well for recommending which books should get published or whether other people should buy them, that would be a pretty good gig. So, if there any publishing firms or newspapers looking for book reviewers, we should probably talk.

26. I have moderate-to-severe sleep apnea, and Kristy makes up some story about me snoring loudly. So, I now have to sleep with a CPAP machine. By the way, it takes a lot of effort getting accustomed to sleeping with a CPAP machine.

27. I told you that this list would be less than 101.