Pearls

What would happen if Joshua Bell set up to play his Strad in a Washington, D.C. metro station?

I like to think that I would have stopped to listen. But I was fortunate to grow up near San Francisco in the 70’s when some street musicians were actually members of the symphony on a lark. SF had some very good street music in its day.

Nothing about government bureaucrats walking blindly, deafly by is surprising. But reading how a government “computer expert” was buying lotto tickets makes paying taxes even more painful than it is now.

It’s a sad commentary on the rampant innumeracy and lack of critical thinking skills in our nation that lotteries, astrologers, chiropractors, accupuncturists, and a laundry list of pseudo-sciences thrive – let alone exist.

We need to teach skepticism to our kids. The schools won’t do it.

And we also need to make sure that, even if they don’t know who Josuah Bell is, they recognize unusual beauty when it hits them.