The Scorekeeper

THE MIGHTY PENCIL

While it has been said that the pen is mightier than the sword, Philip would certainly argue that the pencil, at least in his world, is the superior weapon of choice.

With baseball season off and running, the Stanley Cup Playoffs on every night, the NBA embarking on its 2 month playoff schedule, and football season just around the corner, there's not a moment that the mighty pencil is not tightly gripped and recording at the speed of light!

No one is safe these days around the score keeping scribe! The finely-honed, expertly wielded, graphite weapons of mass destruction are a threat to one and all. Welcoming handshakes, endearing embraces, jovial jostling - why even the innocent, wholesome high-five - all keep us on high security alert. It's a war in here, I tell you...a war!

Yesterday I was once again preparing a magnificent meal for the evening dinner. Philip came into the kitchen complaining that he was tired. I asked him if he had not slept well the night before? He said he had been 'too busy' watching movies. I inquired as to which ones? "The Perfect Storm," he replied. "It was hilarious!"

I was dumbfounded. If you know the movie at all, you know that everyone on the boat dies during that 'perfect storm'. Outrageous, horrific, depressing...certainly not hilarious! "Philip," I said. "How on earth can you find that movie hilarious? Everyone dies!" "Yeah, I know," he chuckled. "But the part with the fish...it was so funny. What a bunch of morons!"

I quickly challenged his disparaging use of the word 'moron', insisting it was not appropriate. His defense was classic. "But dad, it's just 2 words...more and on...moron!" The logic escaped me. I was about to pursue the discussion when I realized I was holding a sizeable cleaver in my hand with which I had been chopping (I mean delicately dicing) the vegetables. Philip of course was wielding his 7 inch, sharply pointed, yellow HB missile of misguided misery. I didn't stand a chance! "You win buddy!" I conceded, and returned to my culinary artistry. Philip skipped off to his room, completely oblivious of how close we'd come to turning Diane's Haven of Rest (she was due home any minute) into the notorious and infamous Kitchen from Hell!

The Birth of the Pencil

In ancient Rome, scribes wrote on papyrus with a thin metal rod called a stylus, which left a light but readable mark. Other early styluses were made of lead. Today the core of the pencil is still referred to as lead, even though it is made from nontoxic graphite (there is no risk of lead poisoning from a pencil since it contains no lead - just a mixture of clay and graphite). Graphite came into widespread use following the discovery of a large graphite deposit in England in 1564. Graphite left a darker mark than lead, but was so soft and brittle that it required a holder. At first, sticks of graphite were wrapped in string. Later the graphite was inserted into wooden sticks that had been hollowed out by hand. Thus the wood-cased pencil was born!

Pencil Trivia

A pencil will write in zero gravity, upside down, and under water.

One pencil can write 45,000 words.

The typical pencil can draw a line 35 miles long.

The hexagonal shaped pencil was developed as an alternative to the round pencil to keep it from rolling off the desk.

Pencil Art