If you’re looking for a great beach chair read, something enjoyable and informative, I can recommend “Neutrino Hunters: The Thrilling Chase for a Ghostly Particle to Unlock the Secrets of the Universe,” by Ray Jayawardhana. I might write about the book some other time, but, for...

Let’s review some basic economics: Cost of a lottery ticket: $2. Amount of money I’ll ever win: zero. Value of pipe-dreaming the things I could do if I did win (even though I won’t): priceless. We picked a fine time to contemplate this gig, since I can’t...

I don’t know why I torment myself with these observations, but I’ll note that we’re already more than 10 percent of the way through 2016. That’s as good of a benchmark as any for noting our progress, or lack thereof, toward New Year resolutions. I’ll note one resolution that...

The word of the day is “Sapporo.” I’ve seen the name in various contexts for almost four decades, so I thought I’d ponder how this name and I keep crossing paths. If you’re good at geography, you’ll recognize it as the name of a large Japanese...