NOT ALL YOU NEED TO KNOW

Our high school physics teacher was called out of town because his father fell ill. Things had not been going well in the classroom for him or us. Teacher and students alike were struggling, some more than others. It was mid-April and a temporary substitute was called in. For whatever reason, Mr. L. never returned to resume his teaching duties and the class never learned why. But we had Ms. R., a brilliant and somewhat ferocious sub who was determined to shape us up for the Regents exam. Her work was cut out for her, as we soon learned we were sadly in arrears as to the basic knowledge of physics. I thought there was no hope for me until one day Ms. R. stood at the front of the classroom, her determination to teach us something, anything, at this late date prompting her to make this statement: " I don't care if you learn anything else from this class but this one thing. Newton's Third Law of Physics states that every action has an equal and opposite reaction!" I felt strangely reassured though by this time my knowledge of physics was minimal at best. Fool that I was. Decades later, that is still all I know about physics. Which brings to mind that I still can relate the Chemistry formula NaCl+ H2SO4--NaHSo4 + 2 HCl (yielded as a gas)This might be right but I don't know why really. If I could just delete some of this mind clutter, I could learn something that matters.