Bilbo's Random Thought Collection

Every time I think things can't get any more screwed up, reality tosses another large bucket of cold water in my face to bring me back ...

I've written several times in this space about the amazing amount of junk e-mail I receive (for instance, here and here ), and how its...

While we were visiting in Dayton over the past week, my daughter-in-law Tabitha showed me an enormous book that she's gamely studying f...

We hear a lot about police brutality lately, and indeed there are many troubling incidents which indicate that some police officers are too...

From the Department of I Couldn't Make This Stuff Up comes this major news story: the world's first robot wedding took place in Jap...

Yesterday I got an e-mail from my old friend Dave, with whom I served in Berlin many years ago. He wrote to tell me of an interesting artic...

You may recall that North Korean overlord Kim Jong Un has been in the news from time to time for allegedly devising new and brutal methods ...

As you know, Dear Readers, ol’ Bilbo does not flinch from bringing you the most interesting and useful of information, without regard to th...

Last year I attempted to broaden your perspectives on human behavior by describing the rules by which men select which urinal to use in pub...

Every once in a while comes a story so utterly bizarre that I find myself, quite uncharacteristically, at a loss for words. Here is the lat...

In an earlier post, I discussed an article that listed some of the things Americans could learn from the rest of the world . I have since f...

If, Dear Readers, you are confused because you have been scrolling around looking for Part 1 of this post and not finding it, you just hav...

I ran across an interesting sidelight on our unfortunate experience in Afghanistan the other day. It seems that the CIA was having some dif...

From the Department of I Couldn't Make This Stuff Up comes this story datelined Chicago: Chicago's Mud Facial Bar Adds 'Breast ...

Each year sees a terrible number of deaths, both intentional and accidental, involving firearms. One of the most tragic, and yet most eye-r...

Well ... here in NoVa everything is utterly quiet and covered in a thick blanket of snow; looks to be about six inches in my front yard. Th...

From the Department of I Couldn't Make This Stuff Up Comes this report from - where else? - Faux News: Poop-Powered Bus Hits British Ro...

Living as we do in a land of plenty, we Americans tend to get when we are confronted with unexpected shortages of things we need or want. W...

You have certainly all heard by now of the so-called "Ice Bucket Challenge," in which people are asked to dump a bucket of ice w...

The best-laid plans ... It was only a few days ago that I announced my plan to begin a new system for designating recipients of the Ass C...