Shocking News, Roller Coasters, IBM and Tadpoles

Spiess in the Morning for Monday June 16, 2025.

Rise and Shine Otters, it’s June 16th, and the spruce trees are whispering secrets again—must be something in the Gemini air. If you’re out by the lake this morning, you might spot a heron perched like an old soul in contemplation. Or maybe that’s just how I choose to see it—it is, after all, the season of duality.

Gemini, ruled by Mercury, the planet of communication, thought, movement... and mischief. And boy, June 16 has that Mercurial vibe written all over it. Today is a day for inventors and poets, rebels and renegades. It's the kind of day where a Supreme Court decision can change the way we look at life itself... and a guy named Tupac can show up to teach us about truth in rhyme.

Let’s start way back—with Geronimo. On this day in 1829, the great Apache leader was born. A man who spent his life resisting the erasure of his people. Some say he could see the future in his dreams, others that his spirit was unbreakable. The U.S. Army chased him through deserts and mountains, but never quite captured his soul. Geronimo wasn't just a warrior—he was a symbol, a prayer shouted into the face of inevitability. Still is, really.

Fast-forward a century, and we get Barbara McClintock, born this day in 1902. A quiet revolutionary in a lab coat, she uncovered “jumping genes”—a concept that rewired the field of genetics. At a time when few women were even allowed in the scientific conversation, Barbara didn't just sit at the table—she rebuilt it.

And then there's Bob Ryland, born in 1920. Ever heard of him? He was the first Black man to play professional tennis. Long before Arthur Ashe lifted trophies, Bob was breaking barriers and returning volleys against segregation itself. He later coached the likes of Venus and Serena Williams. You could say his legacy lives in every ace they serve.

If today’s got your sweet tooth tingling, that might be because Pepsi-Cola was born on this day in 1903. The company, not the drink. A syrupy rebellion against Coca-Cola's empire. It started in a pharmacy, as all good American myths do. Flash forward to stadium lights and Super Bowl halftime shows—Pepsi went from tonic to pop culture powerhouse.

And speaking of horsepower, Ford Motor Company was incorporated on this day in 1903. The Model T didn’t just move people—it moved the world. Assembly lines, paved roads, the American dream with four wheels and a horn. Before Ford, travel was for the rich. After Ford, it was for everyone with a dream and a down payment.

Let’s not forget 1911—when a little company called Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company was founded. Doesn’t roll off the tongue like “IBM,” does it? But that’s what it became. One of the big brains behind the digital world. The typewriter, the punch card, the mainframe... and now your wrist can talk to your fridge because of those early number crunchers.

And here’s a thought from 1933: The FDIC was created today in the wake of the Great Depression. Trust had collapsed. People were hiding cash in mattresses and canning jars. So the government stepped in and said, “Hey, your money’s safe.” And for the most part, we’ve believed them ever since. The question, as always, is—should we?

In 1980, the Supreme Court ruled that human-made microorganisms could be patented. Imagine that—owning life, legally. That’s the kind of sentence that makes a philosopher squint and a poet weep. We live in a world now where the blueprint of life is intellectual property. Somewhere, Mary Shelley and Dr. Moreau are nodding from the great beyond.

And for those seeking thrills, 1884 brought us the first purpose-built roller coaster—the Switchback Railway at Coney Island. It moved at six miles an hour and cost a nickel. But it started something. Not just amusement parks, but the whole idea that fear could be fun, that joy could be engineered, and that maybe life is better when your stomach drops and you scream like a banshee with your hands in the air.

And then, of course, there’s Tupac Shakur, born June 16, 1971. A Gemini, naturally. Tupac wasn’t just a rapper. He was Shakespeare in Timberlands. He was rage wrapped in rhythm, vulnerability cloaked in bravado. He spoke of heaven and hell with equal intimacy, as if he’d lived in both. He said, “I’m not saying I’m gonna change the world, but I guarantee I will spark the brain that will.” And you know what? He did.

So here we are, friends. June 16. A day of invention and intensity. A day when roller coasters start rolling, corporations are born, and rebels enter the world—whether through battle cries, tennis courts, test tubes, or turntables.

This is Spiess in the Morning, reminding myself and anyone listening that history doesn’t just live in dusty textbooks—it’s in the fizz of your soda, the beat in your headphones, and the dreams you chase under a Minnesota sun. Whether you’re a warrior, a wordsmith, or just someone trying to make sense of the madness—today, like all days, belongs to you.

Spiess in the Morning here, riding the airwaves like a coyote at sunrise, broadcasting across the wide open, coffee-sipping tundra of our collective consciousness. It’s Monday, and the world, well... she’s at it again.

Sad News. Shock and awe. That’s the flavor of the day, isn’t it? Like someone shook up the snow globe of civilization, and now we’re all just staring—dazed—at the flurry, trying to make sense of the swirling chaos.

I walked into the Elizabeth C-store yesterday for a bag of Giant sunflower seeds and came out with five opinions, three conspiracy theories, and an unsolicited rant about the state of democracy from Sterling’s cousin visiting from St. Louis Park.

Even the squirrels looked stressed this weekend.

And I get it. There’s something almost narcotic about breaking news—those red banners, the flashing chyrons, the way the talking heads lean in like prophets revealing divine secrets from the mountaintop of Manhattan. But here’s the rub, my friends: when everything is urgent, nothing is.

The ancient Greeks had a word: thauma. Wonder. Awe. But awe wasn’t supposed to be exhausting. It was the start of philosophy. A kind of divine confusion that opened the door to wisdom. Now? It’s clickbait in a suit and tie.

See, in this river of information, most folks are drowning while trying to sip. The algorithms, the networks, the headlines—they’re not interested in nourishing your soul. They just want your attention. And attention, well, that’s the new currency, baby. They don’t want you informed—they want you addicted. Keep scrolling, keep fearing, keep arguing with Aunt Mabel over chicken piccata.

So how do I deal with it?

I stop.

I walk. I sit. I breathe. I put the phone down and pick up Robert Louis Stevenson or maybe Tina Fey’s Bossypants. Or I step outside and listen to the blue jays argue over something from their world—like who gets first dibs at the new grub in the bird feeder.

I try to remember that the world is still spinning, even if the news says otherwise.

And here’s a little secret—shock and awe? It loses its power when you stop reacting. When you start listening. When you cultivate stillness like a garden. When you turn down the volume on the world long enough to hear your own heartbeat remind you—you’re still here.

So before you dive headlong into today’s outrage, maybe take a walk down by the river. Watch the water forget everything it just passed. Maybe that’s how we keep our sanity. One ripple at a time.

Stay strong out there, otters. Stay human and stay strong.

Spiess in the Morning broadcasting and podcasting from the spectacular studios next to the swamp and the sky’s just starting to whisper promises over the willow trees. I hope your coffee’s strong, your mind open, and your soul at least half-awake, because we’re diving into the slipstream today—the fast-flowing river of culture, technology, and time itself.

You ever heard of Moore’s Law? It’s not quite a law like Newton’s gravity or Hammurabi’s ‘eye for an eye’ situation… but it might just be one of the most quietly powerful forces shaping our lives. Gordon Moore—co-founder of Intel, a man who could see the future through a microscope—said that the number of transistors on a microchip doubles about every two years, while the cost halves.

That’s exponential growth, folks. What once took up a room now fits in your wristwatch. What once took days is now instantaneous. And while you’re trying to figure out how to turn off your grandmother’s Facebook reminders, some kid in Tokyo’s building a quantum processor the size of a contact lens.

But all rivers have their sources, and if you trace the digital torrent back far enough, you’ll stumble upon something quaint and boxy: the Computing-Tabulating-Recording Company. Not exactly a name that shouts ‘Silicon Valley,’ huh? Founded in 1911—before even the toaster popped its first slice—this little amalgamation of time clocks and punch cards would one day put on a new suit and go by the name we all recognize: IBM.

Big Blue. The godfather of the modern information age. They built the machines that cracked Nazi codes, ran payroll for every Fortune 500 before ‘cloud’ meant anything but rain, and helped usher in a world where your digital shadow might be longer than your actual one. They were the slide rule that turned into a mainframe, the mainframe that turned into a laptop, and now, maybe, the whisper in your smart speaker.

And yet… for all the speed and power and data—our culture still spins on that same axis it always has: stories, meaning, connection. Only now, we just scroll through them faster. Maybe too fast. Like we traded in our bikes for a bullet train and forgot to look out the window.

So maybe today’s a good day to slow it down a notch. Write a letter instead of sending a text. Read a book printed on paper. Or just sit on your porch and listen to the wind brush through the birch trees, like an old analog whisper from the universe.

Moore’s Law may keep the chips shrinking and accelerating, but here in the land of otters, the sunrise still takes its sweet time… and thank God for that.

Spiess in the Morning coming to you from the spectacular studios next to the swamp—where the air is cool, the coffee is warm, and the bass are just now waking up to the sun slipping through birch branches.

I was out by the Pelican River yesterday, just past where the cattails hum with dragonflies and the reeds hide the secret footfalls of deer. I knelt down and there they were—tadpoles. Hundreds of them. Wiggling like commas in the sentence of life. Little squiggles with big eyes, no legs yet, just that hopeful tail pushing them through the murky water of becoming.

It took me right back to childhood—barefoot summers in Games Lake, chasing fireflies and scooping tadpoles into mason jars. We'd hold them up to the light like they were moon rocks, watching, waiting. Every day a metamorphosis in motion. They were a magic trick that took weeks. One day, a tail. The next, legs. Then one day—gone. Frog.

And isn't that just like life, folks? A transformation in slow motion. You don’t know it’s happening until the water gets too shallow and you need lungs instead of gills. We grow legs when the ground calls us. Childhood to adulthood. Love to heartbreak. Certainty to mystery.

Now, if you were Lakota or Hopi, those tadpoles weren’t just biology—they were symbols. Messengers. The Lakota see them as bringers of rain and new beginnings. Their arrival in ponds and puddles marks a sacred cycle—the Earth breathing in and out with the seasons. For the Hopi, the frog and his pre-frog counterpart, the tadpole, are water spirits. They are born of water, shaped by it, dependent on it. Kind of like us, when you think about it. Our lives are fluid. Shaped by what we’re immersed in.

In some Cherokee stories, the tadpole represents promise. Potential. An in-between creature—a spirit that hasn’t chosen its path yet. It exists in the liminal space, that sacred gap between one reality and the next. And Native elders have said, watch the tadpole, learn from it—because life is change, and you must learn to change with it.

Over in West Africa, there’s a myth where the tadpole is the trickster. Pretends to be a fish, then up and sprouts legs like a lizard. Nature’s practical joker. Always shifting shape, never quite what you expect. Which, if you ask me, is the universe’s way of keeping us humble. Just when you think you've got someone—or something—figured out, they go and grow legs.

Back in my Catholic school days, the nuns used to say God made man from clay. But I think if He had a do-over, He might’ve tried tadpoles. More versatile. Less rigid. More forgiving of mistakes. I mean, who hasn’t lived a chapter of their life as a tadpole? Floating. Trying to figure out who you are. Wondering if you’ll ever grow legs and leap into the wide, wet world of frogs and fate.

So here’s to the tadpole—the in-between, the half-this and half-that, the mystery in the muck. The kid who hasn’t yet decided what to be when he grows up. The artist in a cubicle, the wanderer in a town full of maps. The soul who knows that change isn’t something to fear—it’s something to flow with.

Alright, Otters, time to refill that coffee cup, maybe take a stroll by the water. And if you see a little tail wiggling in the shadows—don’t step on it. That’s the future, my friend. Learning how to swim before it learns how to leap.

This is Spiess in the Morning—reminding myself and anyone else listening that we are all, in some way, tadpoles. We just don't all realize we're growing legs.

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