LAST year marked the 150th anniversary of Charles Darwin?s groundbreaking work ?On the Origin of Species,? which detailed his work on evolution. It was also the 200th anniversary of his birth.

Evolution symposia, plays, and parties were held around the world, to the delight of biologists and paleontologists, and the consternation of fundamentalists and creationists.

Four billion years ago, the first signs of life?microbes in the sea?appeared on our planet. And evolution has not rested since. In the book ?Evolution: The Story of Life,? Douglas Palmer and Peter Barrett describe fossils, dinosaurs, forests, Neanderthals, insects, fishes? practically all the flora and fauna that ever lived and became extinct, and those that are still on earth today.

Filled with colorful illustrations, the book is based on the latest research and backed by hundreds of photographs of fossil evidence. At two key points in the evolutionary process?the explosion of life and mass extinction?the pages of the book expand to reveal the details, including the perennial question: Why did dinosaurs die out?
At the end of the book is an A to Z list of myriad species, together with a timeline that encapsulates the entire process.

Barrett is an internationally renowned natural history illustrator, while Palmer is a science writer for the University of Cambridge Institute of Continuing Education. This book was produced in cooperation with the Natural History Museum, London, which houses one of the world?s best natural history collections.

Remembering stuff

Committing things to memory is not easy. Up to now, when trying to recall the number of days in a month, I resort to the old school rhyme:

?Thirty days hath September,
April, June, and November,
All the rest have thirty-one,
Excepting February alone
And that has twenty-eight days clear,
With twenty-nine in each leap year.?

As for the colors of the rainbow: ROYGBIV (red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo, violet). The planets? My Very Educated Mother Just Served Us Nine Potatoes (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune). Since Pluto is no longer a planet, I guess I should teach my child a variation?instead of nine potatoes, a serving of noodles will do.

In her amusing yet useful book, ?i before e (except after c),? Judy Parkinson lists clever strategies for remembering things. The title comes from the popular spelling rule which, according to Parkinson, should be replaced by a better one:

?i before e, except after c,
or when sounded like a
as in neighbor and weigh,
drop this rule when -c sounds as -sh.?

Aside from teaching us how to spell ?believe? and ?conceive? correctly, this verse now accommodates rules for spelling these words: ?neither,? ?leisure,? ?species.?

To remember the countries of Central America, keep this in mind: Great Big Hungry Elephants Nearly Consumed Panama (Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Panama).

How about cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR)? Remember your ABC?s: Airways, Breathing, Circulation. For injuries, think RICE: Rest, Ice, Compression, Elevation. For stroke victims, think FAST: Face (is one side of the face drooping downwards?), Arm (can he/she raise both arms?), Speech (is speech slurred?), Time (time is critical, call an ambulance immediately).

Filled with fun mnemonics, Parkinson?s book is indispensable for every teacher, student, parent, and anyone who needs to memorize stuff.

Numbers

Numbers are not limited to mathematics, but are found in religion, history, fiction, culture. In his entertaining book, ?As Easy as Pi: Stuff about Numbers that Isn?t Just Maths,? Jamie Buchan describes numbers in everyday life.

We use numbers a lot in language. ?The third degree? originally referred to American police interrogations, usually violent. Now it is used to describe any needlessly intrusive action, where someone may complain of being given ?the third degree? about a past act. The phrase comes from the rituals of Freemasonry, where admission to the third degree required members to undergo difficult interrogations.

?To be on cloud nine? means to be extremely happy. This comes from the United States Meteorological Service?s system for classifying cloud formations, where nine is the highest (cumulonimbus clouds reaching up to 40,000 feet).

Numbers appear in fiction. In Ray Bradbury?s novel ?Fahrenheit 451,? books are burned in an anti-intellectual society. The title comes from the temperature at which paper burns. In Victor Hugo?s novel ?Les Miserables,? the prisoner Jean Valjean?s number was 24601, because Hugo was born on June 24, 1801.

Buchan also writes about the golden ratio, pi, numbers scams, the 10 percent myth, Chinese lucky and unlucky numbers, the Fibonacci sequence, the binary system, the Monty Hall problem, and many other interesting ways numbers impact our lives.

These three books are available at National Book Store and Powerbooks.

Contact the author at blessbook@yahoo.com.