Two weeks ago on a Sunday morning I walked into my kitchen and there on the table was my new w book. Actually it wasn’t exactly new. I had bought it the day before at our flea market. It looked expensive but I paid only seventy-five cents for it. I think it was a bargain.

The guy who sold it to me called it an encyclopedia and I am glad I bought it. Everything you want to know is in there. Me, I always wanted to understand Einstein and his Theory of Relativity and I finally decided to study that theory. So I started to read up on it in the encyclopedia.

I am glad I did study his theory, which is really quite simple. He just thought about what time is and what space is and found out all kinds of new stuff. And I was amazed he did all that without a fancy laboratory or doing some of those experiments like the other scientists I read about.

A few days later I woke up in the morning, but not all the way. I was sort of not awake and not asleep. And at those half-and-half times I do my best and most profound thinking. That morning I thought about Albert Einstein and his Theory of Relativity that I had studied the other Sunday.

For instance, his theory says that things that move very fast will start shrinking. They will shrink more and more as they move faster and faster. And right there it dawned on me that I have proof of his theory.

Last year I was traveling to Phoenix on the interstate and I was going faster and faster until an Arizona state trooper was kind enough to remind me of the speed limit. He also told me the exact speed I had been driving. Same thing happened again this summer. And again it was an Arizona state trooper who took the time to inform me of the speed I had been driving.

Now that I think about it I can clearly see the connection between speed and shrinking. At the higher speed my bank balance shrank more than at the slower speed. In fact, when I drive real slow, like during the rush hour here in Yuma, my bank balance does not shrink at all. Yes, Albert got it right.

Another thing he said was that light from a star will bend when it’s close to a really big thing like our sun. And some scientists went and checked it. They found out that the light from a faraway star really bent around the sun. They saw the light coming around the sun just a bit before they could actually see the star it was coming from. So they proved he was right about that also.

On another night I started to think about astronomy and cosmology and how the Universe is expanding at a faster and faster rate. And again Einstein’s Theory of Relativity tells what will happen. It says that time moves slower with higher speed.

He must be right. As the Universe speeds up, everything moves slower. That includes me. Me especially. And therefore also my hands. I can tell this is true if I compare how much I could accomplish fifty years ago during eight hours against how much I can do now during that time.

There is an even better proof. As the Universe expands the distance between objects gets bigger. This is so obvious that I wonder why I had not thought before of Einstein when I walk from my house to the end of the block. It is definitely farther now than it was just ten years ago.

Yes, I enjoy those special times between sleep and awake. It gives me a chance to ponder the deep questions of science.

And don’t get me going about global warming. Just the other day me and my buddies were having a beer at my place when that subject came up and Freddy said, ”Bull, there ain’t no such thing, it’s them oil companies want you believe that”.

So I told him, “There is no doubt about it Freddie, it’s happening right now and I can prove it to you. You are a mechanic and so you know that heat makes things expand. Now, with the earth warming up it expands, it’s getting bigger and bigger. A bigger earth has more gravity than a smaller earth and that makes things heavier. You can see that when you step on the scale at the doctor’s office. You can see right away you are heavier now than ten years ago.

Let me show you one more thing what that bigger gravity does. Go ahead all you guys and stand up. Look down in front of you and you can see how part of your chest has already been pulled below your navel. Ain’t the beer that done that, it’s that global warming that’s getting at you guys”.