Challenge Day 14: A picture of his family

"Let me show you", said Tom Snare. "Here’s a picture of my family. There’s my wife Ride to the upper left. She always want to be on top. And that’s my daughter Crash". He pointed to the picture.  "She always  causes me a lot of problems. Then there’s Tom Jr. He's a nice guy of course."

Challenge Day 13: Childhood

“I’ve always wanted to be a Catholic priest,” she said.

“I’m sure you would have been a great priest”, he smiled

Nancy turned her chair in the opposite direction.

 “Now, let’s pretend I’m the priest and you’re coming to confess your sins. I turn around so that I can’t see you. Tell me about all your sins. Let’s start with your childhood.”

“I was the only child in my family for six years. I was living a very safe and protected life among adults,” he started.

“Cut the crap, Tom. I’m the priest. I only want to hear the bad stuff.”

“When I was 10 years old, I stole apples from the neighbor’s garden”

“Stealing is not good, Tom. I hope you’re not doing it anymore. But with all the wars and hunger around the world, do you think God worries about a kid stealing apples? Tell me some really bad and naughty stuff.”

“When I was 12 years old I noticed a tickling feeling in my crotch when I climbed the ropes in the gymnasium in a special way.”

“That’s when you discovered masturbation.”

“It’s a sin, isn’t it?”

“No, not at all. Everybody should do that.”

 “When I was 14 years old, I was on a summer camp for kids. We  peeped at the girls in the shower through the keyhole.”

“That’s natural at that age. I bet the girls were watching you through the key hole in the boys’ shower too. The priests  and monks are doing this all the time, and they don’t stop with the peeping.”

“You don’t sound like a priest to me,” he said.

“ I’m the first ever female priest in the Catholic Church. I’m doing things differently.”

Challenge Day 12: Biggest impact on his life

“I was 18 yo and a fairly good soccer player, said Tom. “I wasn’t very good, nothing like Messi, just fairly good.”

He paused for a while, to bring back old memories.

“It was a cold and rainy Sunday in September.  We played against one of the best teams in the league. I got a pass from the central midfielder, and advanced forward with the ball. Then there was this huge guy who came from behind. He missed the ball, but hit my leg. That was the end of my career. I spent the next 6 months with my leg plastered. ”

“You must have hated this guy who kicked you,” said Nancy.

“Yes, at first I did. But a year later, I sent him Christmas card to thank him.”

“You thanked him for destroying your soccer career?”

“Yes, because during the 6 months with my leg injured, I discovered Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy. I read books about nuclear physics and quarks. I studied Riemannian geometry and the theory of relativity. I found there’s more to life than running after a ball.”

Challenge Day 11: The best day in his life

It was a sunny morning in the beginning of May and Tom Snare got up early, which was very wise because this could be the best day in his life, and on such a day it’s good to be early up to really take advantage of it, but then he realized that the best day in his life was probably the day when he won the lottery of mankind, and happened to be born and grow up in one of the richest countries in the world with democracy and human rights and public school and heath care, rather than in a poor desert country suffering in endless drought and civil wars.

It makes a difference, it really does >:)

(I took the picture above many years ago in the West Texas desert on a dry river bed, a so-called wadi, which is cool if you're a privileged scientist who get to travel around the world to study geology, but not if you're a poor nomad and this is all you see when you go out of the tent in the morning to get some water.)

Challenge Day 10: One person you can trust

Tom Snare waited for her at the top of the stairway. Nancy had stopped to put on a shirt to cover her bare shoulders.

“Then you’re properly dressed,” he said, “let’s get in”

Inside it was cool and dim. Some small lights were burning under a painting of Virgin Mary. They found some free seats in the back.  

The priest with his back towards the congregation was singing the liturgy from the altar.

At the end of the mass, the congregation rose from their seats, saying a prayer. Then it was over and everybody walked towards the big open door.

“I always enjoy going to Catholic mass,” said Tom, “it’s a fascinating show.”

“The Catholic Church remains the same. No female priests,  monks and nuns suffering in celibate.”

“You can always trust the priest, he keeps on telling the same tales and the same lies as always.”

(I took the picture above in Cathedral of Saint Mary the Crowned in Gibraltar a couple of weeks ago,)

Challenge Day 09: Wish he could do

"I love this warm Mediterranean climate," said Nancy, "I wish I could stay here forever, sunbathing and swimming in the sea, wearing almost no clothes at all."

"I just wish I could solve the heat equation," said Tom.

"Can't you?"

"Yes, I can."

"Then it's not a valid wish."

"I wish I could climb the highest mountains without being tired," said Tom, "and I wish I could ski down from the mountain in the deepest powder, alone under the pale northern sun."

"Oh, Tom. You're such a boring hermit," she pouted.

He looked at her tan legs and chunky thighs, only partly covered by her skirt. He knew she was right.

(The picture is from my archives, taken on Corsica three years ago)

Challenge Day 08: Three words

"Classical physics isn't wrong after quantum mechanics", Tom said.

"You just need to know how and when to apply it, right?"

"Yes, it's like the words I say everyday; truths, lies and hypotheses"

Challenge Day 07: To win the heart

Tom Snare pulled his cap down to protect his eyes from the sun.

“It’s the Atlantic to the right and the Mediterranean to the left ”, he said.

“And we get a glimpse of Africa on the other side,” Nancy added.

“Spain and England have been arguing about this rock for centuries.”

“Yes, the border was closed for 16 years, but Spain had to re-open it to get into the European Union in the 1980s.”

“There was a British prime minister who once said that Great Britain has no long-term allies, only long-term interests.”

“It’s a place of great strategic interest, to get control over the Strait of Gibraltar.”

Tom sighed. “I don’t like strategies,” he said, “it smells manipulation and slyness.”

“So, being strategic is not a good strategy to win your heart?”

Nancy smiled and looked at him through her Prada sunglasses, fake, bought for 5 Euros from an illegal African immigrant.

“My heart was won years ago,” Tom replied.

“Is there a 2^nd or 3^rd prize still to be won?”

“Maybe.”

“And what does it take?”

“Mind and body.”

“Well, the first is easy, but I don’t have the body of a super model.”

“Don’t worry. Just keep it like that,” Tom said.

Challenge Day 06: Can't live without

Tom Snare and Nancy Victor were the last two persons by the baggage claim. Just a single gray suitcase without an owner was still on the transport band.

“Damn, seems like we’ve lost our baggage”, Nancy said.

“Then we better get out of here, and go shopping”, said Tom, “at the airline’s cost”.

Tom pointed out the direction to the custom, with the green sign over the ‘nothing to declare’ lane.

“I got some stuff that I can’t live without in my suitcase,” Nancy said.

“The things I can’t live without always go in my carry-on bag”, Tom said, “such as my lap-top not book and iPod, and my skis are safe at home.  I never put important stuff in your check-in baggage. ”

“I do,” Nancy replied, “because some of it would be too embarrassing to pull out at the security check. The contents of a woman’s toilet bag is a secret kept.”

Challenge Day 05: In the bed

Owen finished his 3rd pint of dark Kozel.

“Another one?”

“We stay with the Czech.  Let’s have a dark Cernovar this time”, Tom replied.

Owen turned around on his chair, following with his eyes two girls passing by. Both had short dresses, one white, the other black.

“Wow”, said Owen, his eyes blank and his voice snorted, “look at those chicks. Imagine both at the same time”.

“Not my type”,  said Tom, “I don’t like the tall and skinny ones.”

“Every man’s dream; two girls at the same time”.

Tom already regretted ordering another beer. Owen started to get rude.

“I rather take one chubby than two skinny”, Tom replied.

“So what’s in your bed, Tom?”

“Except from the chubby and hairy tiger I sleep with every night?” Tom laughed.

“I’m just curious.”

“Usually, there’s nothing in my bed, except me. At the bed stand I have just the usual stuff: Cell phone, iPod, glasses, a pile of books and science papers, and a packet of condoms of course, unopened.”

“Not getting anything?”

“That’s not what I say. It’s just that penetration is overrated.”

Challenge Day 04: Fears

"Religion is founded on humanity’s collective fear of death", Tom Snare said.

Nancy looked at him with an ironic smile

"And because you don’t believe in God, you’re not afraid of death?"

"No, I have no desire for an eternal life."

"Then what are you afraid of, Tom?"

"I have a touch of acrophobia, a fear of heights. I don’t like climbing high."

"Why is that? What’s the worst that can happen when you climb?"

"I can fall down and die"

"But you’re not afraid of death"

"No, but I don’t want it to happen yet"

Challenge Day 03: Annoying things

 Tom Snare relaxed in his seat by the window on the Aeroflot flight to Moscow. Nancy Victor on his left side suddenly slammed her fist into the armrest, her eyes sparking in anger under the black eyeliner and the purple make up on her eye lids.

“I fucking hate it when the asshole in front of me leans his seat backward and steals that little space I’ve got to read and write on my lap top.”

“I find that annoying too”, said Tom,  ”like I find it annoying when people take off their shoes to expose their stinking socks,  and when the bar’s run out of dark beer.”

“But most of all I find it annoying when people “hate“ all kind of things that are just annoying”, he added.

“I agree,” said Nancy, “hate is an overused word. But you know, that’s the way I am. I take it to the extreme.”

“That’s why I like you,” said Tom.

Challenge day 02: Every day

On an early morning, like every morning, Tom Snare woke up when the alarm clock rang.

Got out of bed and made a cup of tea.

Picked up the morning paper at the front door, browsed the news, read the book reviews and skipped the sports pages. Time to go.

Drove his old blue car to the office, and almost hit a kamikaze-student-biker crossing the street.

Drank a double espresso by the coffee machine with a math-guy

Rejected a phone call from an unknown number

Solved an equation he had never been solved before.

Went home to eat something called dinner; too hungry to care.

Took a hot shower after the evening news.

Went to bed and crept up beside her warm body, stroking her soft thighs her belly.

“You make me feel fat when you do that,” she said.

“I like you just the way you are”

“Don’t lie to me”

“I don’t. Not every day.”

Challenge day 01: Ten random facts

“Biggest hype there  is”,  said Tom Snare,  and  reached out for a napkin to wipe off the sauce that he had spilled on his shirt, black as always.  Black trousers, and black shirt, no tie.

Owen Duggan bent over his plate and slurped another oyster out of the shell.

“The teaching, you mean?”

“No, the oysters. Taste  like sea water. I only like the hairy ones”.

Duggan smiled. And put the shell aside.

“You’re a bright guy, Tom. Bright but not smart. You need to learn what’s important. Stop wasting your time on teaching.”

“I enjoy it, getting in touch with the students, sharing my knowledge with young people.”

“That’s OK, but it’s not important. Teaching doesn’t give you any credit. Doing research and writing publications, that’s all that counts in academia. That’s what brings you recognition and fame.”

Tom Snare emptied his pint of dark Kozel, and leaned back in the chair.

“I don’t care,” he said. “I do the things I want to do, not the things I should do.”

Stairway to Cold As Heaven

There has been some complaints about the stairs recently, the stairs in front of our main entrance. They are icy and slippery and difficult to walk, due to snow fall and somewhat sloppy shoveling earlier this winter.

I have argued that this is good. Reaching the top has never been easy, and shouldn't be easy. It should be a real challenge and take some effort.

Maybe this doesn't apply to stairs?

(The photo was taken by me. I even built and painted the stairs last summer. All right reserved) >:D