Billy The Boy Who Killed The Monster

The original story appears in Scandinavian Fairy Tales. I re-tell in a much simplified version.

Billy, a pale and listless boy, likes to talk to the moon. Every evening as the light of the moon streamed like liquid gold over the horizon, Billy would go out of the house and climbed up on the roof. And as the silvery light silently flooded the sea, the fjords, the forests, and the distant glaciers with brightness, he would sing out hymns of praise to the moon.

His mom and dad knew about it and they did not like that at all. One day, as Billy was on the roof and sang the song to the moon, Billy's mother called upon him.

"Stopped singing and come down the roof at once." she continued and flung him a pail. "Go to the well and get some water. At least, you'll be good for something.'


Billy felt crushed. Reluctantly he took the pail and walked to the well which was quite far away from his house.

As he was approaching the well, a stranger stood by the well.

"Who are you?" the boy asked.

"I am Askadalan, a wandering poet." said the stranger. "I have heard your songs that you were singing to the moon; and I like it very much."

"Thank you." said the boy. Billy took a close look on the stranger. The stranger has a black cloth, greenish eye and was terrified by the stranger's look.


"If you like the moon so much, I show you how to contact the moon." the stranger said, " Look down in the well, the moon is there. If you go down the well, you can physically contact the moon."

"The moon in the well is only the reflection. How can I trust you to go down the well without being hurt." said the boy.


The stranger found that he could not persuade the boy to get down the well, and decided to grab the boy and force the boy to get down the well.


The boy kicked and screamed; he finally got hold the stranger's black cloth. The boy pulled and twisted the cloth hoping to chock Askadalan. With a final desperate effort, the cloth tore and billy rolled into the bushes free. With the moonlight, he now saw the stranger much more closely. The stranger actually had three heads, not just one head. The stranger is a monster.

The monster approached the boy and tried to grab to boy. The boy said a silent prayer to the moon. " Please help me, the Moon." Suddenly, he saw a bright shining object near him. It was a scythe with a sharp blade. The boy took the scythe to defend himself against the monster.

The blade under the moon light shone bright against the monster's eyes and the monster could not see a thing. With such an opportunity, the boy used the scythe to kill the monster.

The boy finally stumbled home. His parent saw his body were all covered with bloods. "What happened?" his parent asked. " I killed the three-head monster". Initially, his parent did not believe him but then found out the blood on the boy's body was not from the boy, because the boy had no bleeding wound.

The boy then told his parent how he killed the monster with the help of the moon. Overnight, the boy became the hero of the village he had lived in. Nobody complained about his singing hymns to the moon anymore.

Peter and Napoleon

I have heard this story few years ago during one of Wisconsin Story Tellers Get Together event.

Peter was a Russian peasant living in Ivantown of West Russia. Ivantown was such a small town that French soldiers did not notice its existence in the map when French invaded Russia in 1812.

Two years after French invasion, French retreated in a hurry. Retreating French soldiers occasionally strayed and wandered around the farms of Ivantown looking for shelter and help; so were the Russian soldiers who were chasing and hunting after the French soldiers. Peter was apolitical; when French needed help, he helped them. Peter also helped the Russian soldiers if they need food or shelter.

One day, there were two French came to Peter asking for help. One was a normal size French soldier; one was very short. The short French soldier wore a special uniform decorating with many shining medals.

"Hide me, please" The French soldiers pleaded.
"Why don't you go under that mattress", Peter said.

Peter then put sheets covering the mattress.

Few moment later, a group of Russian soldiers came to Peter.

"Have you seen any French soldiers?" , the Russian soldiers asked.
"No", Peter said.

The Russian soldiers searched the house, poke everything with their bayonets. After finding nothing in the house, the Russian soldiers went away.

"You save our lives," the French soldiers said coming out the mattress.
"I am the French emperor, the mighty, all powerful Napoleon," the short French soldier continued, " because you have saved our lives, in return, I am going to grant you three wishes".

"What are your three big wishes in your life?" the French asked.

After hesitating a while, Peter said, " I have married my wife for more than 40 years. I love my wife; but because I am so poor, I don't have money to buy her a gift. So, my first wish is to buy a pair of dress shoe for my wife."

" Your first wish is granted. we will buy your wife the most fashionable French dress shoes for your wife. What is your second wish? " asked Napoleon.

" We lived in this house for more than 25 years", after hesitating a few moment, Peter continued, " the roof is leaking. I would like to have my roof repaired."

"Your second wish is granted. We will fix your roof with the best materials produce in France. What is your third wish? Make it big; because I am the emperor. I can do anything."

This made Peter hesitating even more. Being a simple Russian peasant, a new roof and a pair of new shoes were good enough for him. "What is my third wish? " Peter thought hard.

Finally, he said to Napoleon,

"A few moment ago, you were hiding below a mattress while the Russian soldiers were poking with their bayonets. What was your feeling?"

Napoleon suddenly became very angry. "This is an insult to the emperor. Soldiers take him"

Any person giving insult to the French emperor would be shot. The French soldiers seized Peter and tied him to a post.

French execution of a prisoner usually took place at dawn. The prisoner would be taken to a place in front of a firing squad. Under the commanding order, "1" means soldiers would take the firearm; "2" means "to aim"; and "3" means "to shoot".

At the dawn, Peter was brought to the place in front of a firing squad. French soldiers put a blindfold over his eyes.

"1", the commander ordered, and the soldiers reached out their fire arms.

"2", and the soldiers were aiming at Peter.

"Stop". came a voice of a galloping personal messenger from Napoleon.

"Peter's life will be spared." said the messenger. The messenger also handed Peter a note, a handwritten note from the emperor.

"You were asking me how I felt when Russians were poking the mattress with the bayonets. I think after you survived the firing squad, you should have got your answer from this experience."

Fox River in Appleton Has Plenty of Bases

Fox River in Appleton has plenty of smallmouth-bases and rock-base. The smallmouth bass is generally brown (seldom yellow) with red eyes,and dark brown vertical bands, rather than a horizontal band along the side. According to Wikipedia, female smallmouth base is larger than male smallmouth base. Adult male smallmouth base weighs approximately 2 pounds, while the female weighs approximately 5 to 6 pounds.

My friend, Dr. Yang and I fish few days ago; he caught about 10 fish while I caught about 5 fish. One of the fish caught by Dr. Yang was a 2-pound smallmouth base. He was very happy with that.

Photos attached showed the games caught by me and Dr. Yang.

How much Is 30,000 Barrels A Day of Oil Spill?

It has been more than two months since BP(British Petroleum) offshore oil spill off the coast of Gulf of Mexico. It was initially stated that 5000 barrels of oil spill per day. Now, the new estimate is 30,000 barrels of oil spill per day.

Exactly, how much oil is 30,000 barrels? I did some research on the data. Here are the results: 1 barrel is 40 gallon, and 1 gallon is 3.785 L. 30,000 barrels is equivalent to 4.5 million Liters. A standard Olympic size swimming pool has a volume of approximately 2.5 million Liter.

The results, BP oil spill is equivalent to 1.8 standard Olympic size swimming pool volume of oil spill everyday.

Dr. Chen Got A Raise. But, How much?

Yesterday, Dr. Chen received a letter from the Provost of the University. The letter says, "I am pleased to inform you that .... you will receive a basis rate adjustment of 3.93% salary increase effective August 23, 2010."

The letter continues, " As a reminder, the Governor issued Executive Order 285 mandating furloughs currently remains in effect through June 30, 2011. Therefore, under the UW System plan for implementing the furloughs, your salary will be reduced by 3.065% through June 30, 3022."

So, Dr. Chen net salary raise ends up of 0.865% of raise in 2010.

The letter continues, " Congratulations on your salary adjustment. I wish you continued success in your career."

Global Warming and Ice Core Analysis

The Earth is rapidly warming-up. This is what the news media telling us everyday. The scientific journal also presents scientific data that shows the Earth temperature has increased about 1.5 C over the last 100 years.

Being a chemistry professor, I am very curious on how this data is collected and why this 1.5 C temperature rise is such a big deal

First, this is about data analysis: How do scientist know the Earth temperature profile over thousand or hundred of thousand years ? It turns out their data are based on ice-core isotope ratio analysis. Let me explain how this is done.

First, they drill and take ice core over a frozen lake out of Greenland. The depth of the ice core will correspond to the years-past that the ice were formed; assuming the ice never melted and new snow would cover over the old ice and snow-ice were accumulated over million years. Then take the ice sample at a particular depth which corresponds to the years that the ice were formed, scientists measured their hydrogen isotope ratio. Well, a question is what this isotope ratio is going to tell us about the temperature.

This has something to do with the difference of the vapor pressure-temperature profile between H2O and D2O. Being heavier than H2O, at a given temperature, the vapor pressure of D2O is lower than that of H2O. So, there will be more H2O vapor than D2O vapor at any given temperature. As the Earth temperature gets warmer, then H2O vapor will be even more abundant than D2O vapor; thus a smaller H/D ratio in the condensed phase of the ice core sample. Thus by measuring the H/D ratios over different ice core depth, scientist can reconstruct Earth temperatures over million of years of past history.

This would be a great problem exercise for a physical chemistry student to put their knowledge of vapor pressure concept into the context of the real-world problem-solving.

A Very Good Old Man

I heard this story from the National Public Radio. It has a funny twist which I would like to share with my readers.

Once upon a time, there was a very good old man. He was so good that he would not hurt any animals not even a mosquito which sucked his blood.

There was such a mosquito which sat on his arm sucking his blood. The old man said that such a poor mosquito who must be very hungry. Let the mosquito fed with my blood.

The mosquito fed on his blood for a while then felt satisfied and flew away.

But, then the mosquito told his mosquito friends. So, a hundred mosquito came to suck this good old man's blood.

These hundred mosquito then told their mosquito friends. So a thousand mosquito came to suck this good old man's blood.

Pretty soon, a million mosquito came. By the time, these million mosquito were fed, the very good old man died.

The end.

Ms. Taku's Rhyme and Tune was Such A Pleasant Surprise At Appleton Library

It was a rainy day on Sunday of April 25, 2010. We went to Appleton Library for an Austria movie, "Revenge". We were at the library about half an hour earlier than the show time. There was a free music performance at the library atrium. It was Ms, Taku's Rhyme and Tune show. Ms. Taku led us singing folk songs from all over the world including Buddhist chanting, Islam's prayer and Israel's melody. The audience, most of them are children then played the percussion instrument following the rhythm of the songs. It was such a great joy.

Concerning about movie, we did not finish watching the movies; we were turned off by the beginning sexual explicit scenes between the main character and the prostitute.

Ms. Taku's "Rhyme and Tune" experiences were much better. She has the following web site. Ms.Taku.com.

An Old Photo Brings Up Old Day Joy of Raising Kids

Raising children is expensive counting about all the child care, medical care and educational expenses. However, for Meeilei and I, raising Victor and Leo was such a joy and blessing. The happiness that we have received from Victor and Leo are far greater than all the hard work we have done for them.

Our church friend gave us the attached photo few days ago. It was taken on November 24, 1988, during church's Thanksgiving celebration. Victor was 11 years and Leo was 8 years old. Victor played cello while Leo played violin in the celebration. I say in a chair across them with a black sweater and a light jacket. I don't remember which music they were playing at the celebration.

In 1988, Meeilei's mother died. She flew back to Taiwan for her mom's funeral in November. She was not in the photo.

Renard Recorder Consort will Play in Appleton Library in September, 2010

Here is some exciting news for Dr. Chen's friends in Appleton. Our recorder group will play in Appleton library in September, 2010. We have about 1 hr. repertoire of music to perform.

The Appleton recorder group has been in existence since we moved to Wisconsin in 1984. There were some interruption during last 27 years. about 5 years ago, 2 music faculty from UW-Oshkosh and Lawrence University together with several very high quality musicians joined us, the Appleton recorder group has a face-lifting experience. Since then, the group has a name, called the Renard Consort, and has an unofficial music director, Dr. James C who is the music professor at UW-Oshkosh.

Since we moved to Wisconsin in 1984, I have taken many hobbies and sport. Many of them such as judo, and down hill ski, I did not keep up. But recorder is the hobby I still keep today. My wife joined the recorder group in 2009. Now, I am more motivated to practice at least once per day. It is even more fun to play duet with my wife.

Attached is the photo for the Renard Recorder Consort. Back row from the left:

Caroline, H., (a librarian), Frank C (Professor, UW-Green Bay), Bruce (Chemist, George-Pacific), Dona D (Professor, Lawrence University), Becky (Teacher, Menasha High school), James, C (Professor, UW-Oshkosh)

Front-row: Judy (Musician), Dee (Musician), Barbara (Consort mother), Meeilei (Retired programmer), Miriam D (Chemistry instructor, Fox Valley Technical College)

At the First Sign of Spring...

At the first sign of spring in Wisconsin, the tree is budding new leaves and UW-Green Bay faculty has a celebration in the name of promoting scholarship. Photos show the budding leaves and fellow faculty musicians at the celebration. My friend (in the middle), Dr. Craig Hanke, plays the base guitar.

Keith White Prairie-My UWGB Retreat

The place I am working as a professor doesn't pay me very much. However, UW-Green Bay does have a beautiful campus. Circling around the campus is a 6-mile long walking, bicycling or cross-country-ski trail. I was too busy to visit them during my early career at this campus. After experiencing long illness in the last year, I realize everyday's life is God's gift and I need to find time to appreciate God's creation of nature and bauty.

This 6-mile long trail winds through a 16 acre grassland of the so-called Keith White Prairie. This prairie was established in 1972 under the guidance of Professor Keith White, who continued the site even after his retirement in 1989. Professor White's students assisted with site preparation, planting, and burning, a tradition that is continued today by faculty and students at UW-Green Bay.

Early explorers called the vast North American grasslands "prairie" after the French word for meadow. Prairies were once home to bison, elk, wolves and badgers. They extended from central Canada to the Gulf of Mexico, through part of Minnesota, Wisconsin, Illinois and Iowa.

The dominant grasses at the Keith White prairie are big blue stem, switch grass, and Indian grass. They develop enormous root systems, sometimes growing as deep as 3 meters. Prairie plants are well adopted to fire, drought, and grazing.

Pictures show summer and spring view of the Keith White prairie.

Bad Mouth No More...

I heard this story from one of the inspiration seminars that I listened to a while ago. The moral of the story is to be careful on what we say to other people; because it may be the last word you would have to say to other people.

A sister of 14 years old and a brother of 12 years old were transported to Auschwitz concentration camp from Warsaw. The sister was meticulously dressed; the brother was not. The sister felt embarrassed when she saw her brother's shoes were not neatly tied.

"Can't you tie your shoe laces nicely?" she yelled at him.

At the Auschwitz concentration camp, the sister and the brother were separated. At the end of the War, the sister survived the camp; but her brother did not.

She could not imagine herself that the last words she had ever said to her brother was her yelling at him... "Can't you tie your shoe laces nicely?"

After the camp, she made a vow to herself, never bad mouth to anyone because she never knew that could become the last words she had ever to say to someone she loved.

Dr. Chen is on The Recovery Path

After more than 7-month-long illness, I finally saw my GI specialist to give me a complete thorough diagnosis through blood test, endoscopy, CAT scan, ultrasound, and colonscopy. The diagnosis results are: (1) negative on cancer; (2) moderate gastritis, and bacteria infection positive; (3) negative on auto-immune problems (4) liver and pancreatic look fine.

I have finished my antibiotic treatment and continued on proton pump inhibitor treatment. I am also managing my stress through meditation, chiropractor and acupuncture treatments.

Although the recovery process could be very long, I do expect a complete recovery of my health to be productive again for my life.

I thank everyone from NCHU colleagues, students and UWGB colleagues and students, from Taiwanese friends in the US, and from friends of Memorial Presbyterian Church in Appleton for their expression of kindness and concern during my struggling with the illness. Many thank to you all.

Acid Foods or No Acid Foods? Dr. Chen is Completely Puzzled

Back in the fall of 2009, Dr. Chen had an endoscopy with a surgeon. The diagnosis was the acid reflux with Barret esophagus, and mild gastritis. The treatment was proton pump inhibitor, anti-acids, and avoid all acidic food. Well, I have being doing exactly like that for the last seven months, and the symptoms do not go away.

On Feb 2, 2010, Dr. Chen had another endoscopy; this time was with a GI specialist. The diagnosis was the severe gastritis over the duodenum area. The specialist gave me a new medicine, Sucrafate which is a medicine to treat ulcer. This medicine requires stomach acid to form a protective layer over the stomach lining. The medicine would not work if there is no acid in the stomach.

So, at this moment, Dr. Chen needs to juggle between acid food, alkaline food, medicine that needs acids, and medicine that reduces acids. It is quite a mind-puzzling management.

I will report to you how does the new treatment go.

Dr. Chen Adds Acupuncture and Chiropractor into His Treatment of Chronicle Illness

When I was in Taiwan, I received both modern and Chinese ancient medical treatments when I was sick. Taiwanese medical insurance recognizes the values of both treatment. Things are different in the United States. The medical insurance in the US covers modern medical treatments and chiropractor service. For acupuncture which I believe its treatment effectiveness, the US medical insurance does not cover the cost for its service.

Seven months into the modern medical diagnosis and treatment and only get the control of its illness prognosis, I decide to take a proactive approach for treating my chronicle illness: add acupuncture and chiropractor for treatment. I had both treatments this week, and I do feel somewhat better after the treatment. However, even the doctors believe that the effectiveness of the treatments and to wait for at least 1-2 weeks; I will report the progress of my conditions in a few weeks.

I had my latest blood test results down few days ago. The blood sodium level has improved from 124 to 131 to 134 (the latest results) against [135-155]. Both ALT and AST (liver enzyme)have dropped to the normal range. But direct bilirubin value is still stubbornly hanging high at 0.40 against [0.00-0.3]. My doctor told me not to worry about it. I will have another blood test down in 2 months, that will be in March. I will report the results then.

I did feel somewhat better these days. I had more energy swimming which is a real gauge of my medical condition.

Friends, thank you for your prayer and concerns. I will report to you my conditions one way or another.

Coping with Chronicle Illness, Dr. Chen's Way

Coping with chronicle illness is easy. With Dr. Chen more than 7 month of illness, everyday, and every meal is a struggle. If not coping correctly, it is easy to set in some irreversible vicious cycles which would end up with self-destruction. I write this down to share with my friends; not for you, because I hope you would never have to go through the suffering I am at this moment. But if you have relatives who are suffering from chronicle illness, this note may be useful.

What are the possible vicious cycles with chronicle illness ? First, the malnutrition vicious cycle. The reason is pretty simple, because the patient has no appetite. Malnutrition can create another problems in addition to your current illness. For Dr. Chen, I am fortunate. I have a dietitian relative who happened had read my suffering story. She called and advised me to drink a complete nutritional balance drink, called Ensure (manufactured and marketed by Abbott Lab.). This drink is not cheap. It costs approximately $1.10 per bottle. But, every time I drink Ensure, I feel somewhat reassured for future recovery.

Second, the depression vicious cycle. The patient has a tendency to withdraw from the social cycles and become self-pity and bitter about life. One way to overcome that is to find a support group. My wife had helped me out to take me out to participate in church choir. I also pray earnestly. Praying forces to articulate what I can find something to be thankful in each day's struggling. I also keep myself busy in preparing my spring semester teaching, because I know that finding the meaning of everyday life keeps me on the track.

Other therapies which I find useful are doing exercise, watching funny shows in the TV. Exercises help me improve appetite at least temporally. Laughter is the best medicine. Find anything funny and laugh the gut is a good therapy.

I share this thought with you. I also need you to continue to pray for me. Anything you do is very comforting to me and I really appreciate it because I know I am not suffering alone.

New Year Greeting and Dr. Chen Needs a Miracle for 2010

Happy New Year, The Year of Ox, 2010.

Friends, I wish I have good news to tell you about my health situation. But, I don't. In fact, since December 21 2009, my health situation is spiraling downward. Before that, although my appetite was not any good to start with, but I still could eat some. Although I felt stomach distress, I never felt nausea. Since December 21, I have lost most of the appetite and I feel nausea more frequently.

I had a blood test on December 28, the initial results were alarming: My blood sodium level was only 124 against a normal range of [135-155]. In fact, this is called the hyponatremia, a medical term describing the disease of low blood sodium. Since sodium ions control the osmotic pressures for all physiological function, this low sodium level could explain the loss of appetite and nausea symptom. Doctor's immediate prescription is to order me restrict fluid intake and liberate up salt intake. I had another blood test on January 4, 2010. The blood sodium level was 131 against a normal range of [135-155]. This new reading is still low, but somewhat better than the results done on December 28. My wife and I had immediate celebration together. I bought a bouquet of flower to her to thank all the care she had given to me over the past 6 months.

Other than somewhat uplifting news of new sodium level, the liver profile was not too uplifting. My AST results was 80 against a normal range of [0-38], total bilrubin was 1.1 against a normal range of [0.3-1.0], direct bilrubin was 0.4 against a normal range of [0-0.3]. Although it is still not a liver crisis, it indicates that my liver function is already compromised.

Meanwhile, I am struggling every meal, and every day and be just glad to be alive one day at a time. I am trying to distract myself from too conscious about the health situation by swimming and playing recorder. The rest of the time, I am in pain.

Friends, I need all of your prayer; not just for me but also for my wife. This illness had caused a lot of stress on my wife, and she needs all the support you can give her.

That is all I want to update you for now. I will tell you more when more diagnosis results are back. Good bye, friends.