I was looking in my “journal” last night, and noticed that I had made a ten items list for unstucking myself, and one of the items is to write 300 words before I do anything else. And I determined to do this today as I woke an hour before I need to be anywhere.

And I opened my computer, and did not arrive immediately at the screen on which I write this. I thought of my education manifesto, on which I found a typo in the title, and opened a tab for my hosting service.

I thought about my on/off again virtual assistant, Gerald, and looked for the weekly post materials from him. I thought about my freelancer working on my politicians list, and wanted to reach out to him. I did actually end up on Facebook, and read a comment by Roger Madon about the Supreme Court being a political institution.

And I scrolled down from there. I thought about this blank page, and I so didn't want to go there. And November, and NaNoWriMo, and if I shouldn't set myself up for that. And I thought about my students, and what they should learn, and how I should engage them, and now I'm thinking about getting some background material on Arthur Miller, and inside that, I just thought I should ask my Stamford people if anyone still has journals or diaries from the late 40s as teenagers that I could share with my students. And now I'm thinking of my Uncle Michael's diaries. He apparently kept notes of every damned interaction he had with the world. I would have loved to see what he wrote around that time.

I suppose there are ways I still am my teen-aged self. I'm certainly still different. It's such a fundamental part of how I be that it's difficult to think of it as a conversation.

So I'm thinking of . . . and I just stopped and wandered off in my mind to the curious case of two students who disappeared from my class; so now I am thinking of appropriate responses, the first might be to look at how I should respond, and formulate a policy with them.

And I'm stopped by the word “curious” that showed up above, and I like it. It's a better place to go than others I could think of, and now I say to myself, “hmmm, I should just publish this.”

So I am going to list some ideas:

1. When does life begin? Give me ten reasons for your position, and ten against. Feel free to refer to biblical sources.
2. When should we be ready to regulate speech? Who should decide? Are there any dangers? Can we trust the decision makers?
3. When should a group be entitled to special treatment? Why?
4. Should laws have fail-safe mechanisms built in? How?
5. What is the role of government? Does this change with the intelligence level of the individual? Should it?
6. Should a person be allowed to sell himself into slavery? When do conditions in a free society leave people in conditions akin to slavery? What is the role of a government to stop this? Should it? Is slavery immoral?
7. What mechanisms can we put into place to curb the bureaucratic state? Should that even be a goal? List ten advantages of a bureaucratic state. List ten disadvantages.
8. What is the role of government? When should you be trusted to govern yourselves?
9. What is my role as teacher? How do you expect me to fulfill that role?
10. Is vegetarianism ethical? Find at least ten ways a vegetarian lifestyle negatively impacts the earth? Is our natural state as vegetarian, carnivore, or something else? Which came first, the carnivore side, or the vegetarian? Make of a list of at least five ways we are adapted to be carnivores? Name at least five negative impacts of man's adoption of an agrarian lifestyle.
11. Are there people who are too dumb to be able to be trusted with making their own decisions? Should we have a basic intelligence test to determine if a person should be allowed to vote? What would be the dangers of such a test?
12. Would you support a universal basic income? What is society's duty to those who can not take care of themselves? Make a list of ten reasons why a universal basic income would be a good idea. Make a list of ten possible negative consequences. How might you design a law to find out? What could you build into that law so that if it doesn't work, it cancels itself? Would this be a wise move?
13. Whom do you admire? Why? Should I admire him as well? Why? Should I respect him or her? Why? And why is “whom” the desired pronoun, or is it?
14. What do you dream about for your future? Is there a reason you should not start pursuing this today?
15. What should be the purpose, goal or mission of our educational system? How well are we working on attaining this?