Having been intrigued by Einstein for quite some time now, I decided to stop by the Skirball Einstein Exhibit in Los Angeles on one of their free Thursdays.

I was hoping that some of their a/v installations might help me understand in the concrete those Einsteinisms that I could only accept on a conceptual level. One video did a pretty good job of showing why an atomic clock in motion has a delay to its tick tock. I appreciated that, but it only made me question more -- so how would a gear-driven clock experience the same slow down? And just because clocks slow down at high speed, how exactly do our biological clocks slow down?

But asking questions is good, so I'm happy the exhibit provoked them from me, as does much of Einstein's interesting life.

What the show may lack in A/V touchy feeling -- it makes up in paraphernalia. Oh, to see seventy-two pages of Einstein's paper on special relativity spread out across forty feet of wall -- that was a bit awe-inspiring. (Yikes, does that make me geeky?) Several of the pages are actual originals.

And then the letters: letters to lovers (he's a man of many women -- not much of a hubby though). And letters to other geniuses: Did you know that despite helpfully hinting the atomic bomb into existence, Albert was very terrified of the implications? He seriously felt that a full out nuclear war was imminent (within the decade following WWII). He even sought to begin an association of intellectuals to help advise against such a catastrophe.

An interesting guy, an interesting exhibit -- just plan on doing more reading than touching and feeling.

Through May 29, 2005 at the Skirball Cultural Center.