The mental exercise referred to as "Schrodinger's Cat" has become a part of our everyday conversations thanks to its appearance in The Big Bang Theory TV show.  The thought experiment was designed to help understanding of how quantum physics interacts with our more observable Newtonian physics based reality.  In the experiment a cat is placed in a box (I'm guessing a solid, soundproof box) with a radioactive isotope detector that is connected to a device that can smash a vial of poison.  The moment the detector senses an isotope (a random occurrence that may never happen), it signals the device to break the vial, which releases the poison and kills the cat.  Without observation, after a period of time it becomes impossible to know if the cat is alive or dead, and can thus be thought of as existing as both alive AND dead until someone opens the box and observes the cat's current state.  Quantum particles work the same way, existing in multiple states until forced to come into contact with our Newtonian universe.

Leave it to a male scientist to come up with such a grim experiment when the same point could have been easily made with a common, life-affirming event: pregnancy.  From the moment a woman discovers that she is pregnant, her child exists in multiple states: male or female, looking more like the mother or the father, healthy or not, etc.  Until the child is directly observed (through ultrasound, other sorts of testing, or birth), that child exists in all states at once.  While people might make guesses about the outcome, only the direct observation brings the child's state into certainty.

Women have known this long before Schrodinger patted himself on the back for his disturbing scenario.  This is why the birth of a child, beyond its physical and hormonal issues, can bring such trauma to a woman despite it being a happy event.  For the mother, the birth of the child reveals that child's ultimate form, but also puts to "death" the other possibilities that the child could have been (not to mention ending the mother's intimate and continual contact with the child).  Even an ultrasound determining a baby's gender can give both joy and sadness; while the parents might rejoice in knowing they are going to have a beautiful baby boy, that knowledge also "kills" the gorgeous baby girl who might have been.

While I connected these ideas, I can't take full credit for them.  It was the second book in the Outlander series, Dragonfly in Amber, by Diana Gabaldon that took me down this line of thought.  As much as some of the scenes in her books disturb me (I almost didn't make it through the first book), I have found a number of gems that have made me examine my world in different ways, which is exactly what good literature should do.

As for Schrodinger, perhaps he should have consulted with a mother before making people think about zombie cats.

It has been a fast month.  I can scarcely believe that the month is over.  It feels as though school began just a few days ago.  Now we are already half way through the marking period.  I can't help but recap the events of this month in my mind.

School started (and has moved through the first month).  So far, despite any political and economical concerns, it's been a good start to the year.

I am not teaching a class at Baker this term.  I have been able to use some of my time to play outside and spend more time after school getting things done at Lincoln.

Janelle's brother visited for the month, staying at her sister's house.  We got to play Carcassonne, hang out, and watch as the tree house he was building got better and better.

We made our annual visit to the Renaissance Festival.

Rowen started preschool.  While initially unwilling to talk to his teacher or most of his classmates, he seems to be enjoying it more now.

The new TV season has begun.  Janelle loves Outlander (which is why I have read the first book).  Dr. Who has been a bit less than I would hope, but I like the new Doctor.  Gotham shows some potential.  The Blacklist started with a great opening.  The Big Bang Theory's first two shows were quite entertaining.  I'm looking forward to the Flash, Arrow, Resurrection, Bones, the 100, and Elementary.

I made one entry to a writing contest.

I'm certain that there is more, but that hits most of the main points.

Yesterday, a friend of mine was explaining how he needed to change one of the questions on the opening survey he gives to students for statistical purposes.  The question was "How many of the Lord of the Rings movies have you seen?"  This summer, for the first time, not a single student in his classes answered "All three".  He asked me if I remembered watching Happy Days as a kid, and if I thought then that the 1950s seemed like they were so long ago.  He then pointed out that the 1950s were closer in time to us when we were watching Happy Days than we are now to when we were children.  Time seems to be moving so quickly now.

This made me think about some other issues of time that make me feel old.  Trevor was born the year before the 9/11 attacks and he's now in the eighth grade.  I have now lived more of my life being married than not, and more of my life being a father than not.  None of my children have lived in a world without the World Wide Web.  I have had my Yahoo email account for nearly half of my life.  Connor and Rowen have always lived in our current house.  Rowen never rode in our Green Silhouette.  Should my daughters have children, those children will probably be closer in age to Rowen than Rowen is to them.

There are some positives to this.  I get to watch Star Trek the Next Generation about every six years.  We're doing so right now since Trevor doesn't really remember seeing them and he's now the age I was when I first watched them.  Considering how little Connor and Rowen stay in the room, we will probably be doing this again.  I will get to do the same with other shows and movies that I love.

It's no wonder that so many of my "pop" references seem to go over my students' heads.  Even video game references which I used to think of as recent (e.g. "The cake is a lie" or "Would you kindly") are met now with a completely blank stare.  It's amazing how fast time has gone by.

Another hero of mine has passed away.  Even though the Internet is full of people discussing, mourning, and reflecting on the passing of Robin Williams, I still want to add my voice to those who are expressing their grief at this loss.

For me, like many people, Robin Williams was the crazy uncle of the family.  Unlike many other actors and comedians, there was something about his presence that made him relatable, if off the wall.  Perhaps part of it, for me, was because I started watching him play Mork while I was still rather young and impressionable.  Through Mork, Robin played a naive, yet lovable, crazy person, someone who helped us examine the craziness in our own lives that we otherwise took for granted.

In a way, his characters in my two favorite movies of his, Good Morning Vietnam and Dead Poets Society (whose ending will make it so I might not watch it again), expanded on this identity that he created with Mork.  In both, he is still an outside observer who helps people understand more about life through his wild manner.  In both, he was also a bit naive and surprised by the harshness of reality.

His passing also brings to light the loneliness that so many people feel.  It amazes me how much we, as humans, isolate ourselves even when we are surrounded by others.  In his case, perhaps his talent and energy brought about a bit of a curse for him.  Perhaps he felt like an outsider in reality which is why some of his roles were so convincing.

I'm not going to pull a moral out of this.  He was a great man who will be missed.

More so than any other television show, except perhaps M.A.S.H., the Rockford Files was a major part of my early childhood.  I don't remember much from the show itself other than its car chases, but I remember Jim Rockford and his personality.  In some ways, I almost thought of him like an uncle.  It sounds weird as I write it, but it was true nonetheless.  

My father was a big fan of James Garner.  I believe his favorite movie is The Americanization of Emily (which is certainly worth watching).  Along with the Rockford Files, he also tried to watch any of the reruns of Maverick, which I enjoyed more, that he could find.  I know that these characters helped to form my idea of what a hero should be.  They didn't seek out confrontations and they often looked for non-violent solutions.  They were concerned about day-to-day life, but had a code of ethics that didn't allow them to ignore the downtrodden.

As I grew up, seeing James Garner in a film or show was like seeing a relative or friend.  I didn't always like the roles that he played, but I still looked forward to seeing him.  With that in mind, his passing has affected me almost as much as if a relative or friend passed away.  It amazes me how much we are affected by the lives of people who never met us.

We watched the first half of the Rockford Files pilot episode last night.  The clothes and hairstyles are entertaining and the show's pacing is MUCH slower than to what we are now accustomed, but the show is still entertaining and it was like seeing an old friend again.  Rest in peace, James Garner.

This show is, for me, the prime example of a guilty pleasure.  I like watching the show, I look forward to it every week, yet I know that television does not need to be this explicit to be good television.  Portions of the show are downright pornographic.  Other portions are violently graphic.  Yet like so many men who claim to read Playboy "just for the articles," the draw of this show is its amazing characters and well-crafted dialogue.

Like the series Rome, I really wish that HBO did not feel the need to make this series so gruesome and sexual.  The story has enough of a draw without those elements, yet those elements make it so I can't share the story with my children, my parents, and even some of my family and friends who just find it to be too much.

And yet I can't stop watching it.  I already know most of what's going to happen as I have read the book series (to the point that it's at right now).  I have similar complaints about the books that I do about the TV show, although the show manages to deal with one of my complaints about the book: too much time is spent doing nothing.  Still, even knowing the outcomes for the next season or two, I am still eager to see how they are going to pull it off on television.

This actually leads to another problem that I have: spoilers.  As I know most of the upcoming events, I find it hard to stay quiet as my friends speculate about characters and plot lines.  The Red Wedding, in particular, was very difficult to keep quiet all the way through seasons two and three.  Even since then, hearing people try to predict what will happen to their beloved characters while I know what will happen pushes the limits of my self-control.

Thus, I'm a torn person.  I enjoy the show, but I don't support portions that they decide to put on television.  I like know what is coming, but I hate having to stay quiet about it.  I recommend that people watch it, but I don't like supporting these kinds of extremes in shows.  It truly is a guilty pleasure.