And then I wrote...

by Dick Schilling, "Editor Emeritus"

... about some miscellaneous things.

I have complained here that the mosquitoes seemed to be pestering me to a greater degree. I’ve heard the thoughts that it is a smell such as after shave that may be responsible, or clothing color. But thanks to the recent publication of this year’s Ig Noble awards by Harvard, I now think I know why I am a target. The Ig Nobel awards are for things the antithesis of the Nobel awards. One recently went to a study that showed mosquitoes are attracted to Limburger cheese. I have Limburger Cheese with crackers for Sunday evening’s meal most weeks. The smelly cheese is an acquired taste, I suppose, but I have always liked it. But I have not figured out how the mosquitoes know that.

There have been a couple letters to the editor of this newspaper recently with suggestions for use of the acreage where the rainwater retention basin was developed, east of Ninth Street NW. It appears to be doing its job, but when not inundated by rain, a large portion of the sizeable area appears to just sit there. I tend to agree it should be put to some use that won’t interfere with its primary purpose. Undeveloped spaces are good for everything and everybody. I could see planting some milkweed plants to help out the endangered Monarch butterflies, and wildflowers such as coneflowers to help bring back the honeybee population.

A headline in one of the dailies screamed about the “fact” that one in five undergrad coeds at the University of Iowa had been raped. It was necessary to read well into the story to discover that only 9.3% of the thousands of coeds had responded to the survey. And that some researchers speculate that those who have experienced a sexual assault are “more likely” to have responded. Do you think? And because the results were anonymous “there is no way to know specifics.”

I did not take a course on statistics, but this layman’s guess would lead me to believe those factors of very low sampling and no definition of terms would render the study worthless, except to provide jobs and incomes to the surveyors and to scare the hell out of parents thinking about sending their daughters to the university.

I listened to noisy AM radio Monday night to hear the Cubs win their 100th game rather than to subject myself to the televised debate between presidential candidates. I figured if anything really sensational happened, I would be able to see and hear it time after weary time next morning; this morning.

What I have heard instead makes me believe I did not miss anything; that the candidates repeated the same charges and made the same points they have been making for weeks on end.
The run by the Cubs to the playoffs as winners is a lot more exciting than watching two losers.