Strom Thurmond gives me problems. These problems came to a head last week as the senior senator from South Carolina took on a highly visible national role. Serving as President pro Tempore of the United States Senate, he opened the proceedings of the impeachment trial of President Clinton.
Thank You for Being Such a Pain
When I served as director of the Cambridge Council on Aging, I dealt often, sometimes daily, with an elderly woman who was famous for complaining about other people. She would telephone city hall with a long list of grievances and, no matter how officials would respond, she was never satisfied.
Colleagues in the City Manager’s office, feeling frustrated, would commonly pass her telephone calls on to me. Like every other public official who ever had to deal with her, I regarded her as impossible to please.
A Scientist Speaks
Among researchers in the biology of aging, Leonard Hayflick has a big reputation. So well known is he in such circles that his name has been given to the limits by which human cells can multiply. Only around 50 times, he discovered decades ago, can such multiplication occur, the so-called “Hayflick limit.” (Some other research, newly reported, suggests that this limit can be overcome.)