Our friend Julie paused as she was walking up the stands to the school pool. She asked how things were going after both her son and our daughter took off to college. I said Skye was doing fine, adjusting to everything, having a blast in her new home.
“It’s not Skye I’m worried about; it’s you,” Read More
Don’t get me wrong; it’s not like I mind watching women in bikinis rolling around in the sand. But it seems as though there’s so much more to see during these Olympics. Yes, I realize this is the XXX Olympiad, but that’s probably not why we’re tuning in.
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May
23
Watering the bare patches of lawn, dug up by dogs or withered by neglect, a hummingbird drops by.
Apr
29
Our dear, darling daughter has finally made her collegiate decision, but it was not without fits and starts. We visited colleges from sea to shining sea over the past few years. Who knew she’d end up on top of a remote hill, in the middle of rural Minnesota?
Don’t feel bad if you’ve never heard of St. Olaf. Most of her friends haven’t either. They say, “Skye? …. Saint? We never would’ve thought you’d attend a school whose first name is Saint.”
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Mar
30
NOTES FROM LONDON
The first time we came to London in Spring, there was snow on the ground. Now, Marci can work on her tan in March.
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Mar
07
Mighty Mouse dances with Krakatoa Katie.
(Go ahead, click on the link if you want to watch the six minute cartoon.)
Thank you internet.
As my buddy Mick Cochran famously noted several years ago, “Who needs a brain, when I have Google?”
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Feb
04
Me, Bill and Magi
Peculiar things, casinos. They’re smelly, loud and their inhabitants wear expressions drained of joy, hope and probably money. Everything you do is furtively watched as you slurk around with a dirty-ass plastic cup filled with an ever-decreasing jangle of quarters. I’ve always felt somewhat guilty going into one. Maybe that’s just my personality makeup. I feel guilty for all sorts of things; drinking a late-night beer in the tub; not always dropping a coin in a collection kettle; saying the word “ass” earlier in the paragraph.
Nov
09
Haven’t we learned over the years that insurance companies know best? Why, just today I received a phone call from my doctor saying Blue Cross wasn’t allowing me to take a drug she prescribed. I’m glad that a faceless person in a call center somewhere denied me my medicine. Obviously they have access to all the most advanced medical technology in the world and can judge, far better than my doctor, what’s best for me.
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Oct
19
There are no mountains.
That’s the first thing I notice around here at The Mountain Workshops, the absence of mountains.
Hills, sure. Ridges, you bet. One could even argue there are crags, escarpments or even bluffs. But mountain may be pushing it a bit. Not that I’m one to talk. Coming from the decidedly flat suburbs of Detroit, our biggest “mountains” are converted garbage dumps that developers covered with dirt and ski lifts then waited for snow.
But the term Mountain Workshops adds a sense of majesty, purple and above fruited plains. That sort of thing.
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