Longtime readers of Reference Frame may remember my opinionated, cigar-smoking friend Professor Mozart, who last appeared in Physics Today in August 1999 (page 11), having dropped in on me after seven years of retirement on a small tobacco plantation in Connecticut. Another eight years having passed, there he was again, at my office door. “W. A.!” I shouted with surprise and delight. “How’s the tobacco business?”
“Left it,” he growled. “Taken the pledge.” And indeed, he gave off no smoky aroma. “Bought a vineyard. Napa Valley. Took up poetry. Thirty-third anniversary of the November revolution of 1974. Third of a century. Time to celebrate with commemorative verses.” He sighed. “Brought the project to the attention of the poet laureate. Doesn’t know enough physics. So,” he added in a business-like tone of voice, “I did it myself.” And before I could say another word of welcome, he declaimed:
At this...