Coping It is a foggy morning on the hilltop today. My mind is geared to my garden and I enjoy a misty or foggy morning for the benefit of the moisture it brings to the plants. I also know by now that it is just a matter of a few hours before it will burn off and it will once again be a sunny and glorious day. It is Sunday and I have the pleasure…
See You in September The Happening was a 1960s cover band that actually had a great deal of success playing and recording music from other bands, but injecting their brand of harmonizing and more upbeat tempos to make the song more their own. They did this with many big hits ofthe 60s including Go Away Little Girl, I Got Rhythm, Why Do Fools Fall in Love and Make Your Own Kind of Music, just to…
In the Land of Nod Somewhere along the way in my education, I always thought of the Land of Nod as being in the state of sleep and drowsiness, referring to that haziness that occurs when we traverse the land of wakefulness into deep sleep. The reference seemed onomatopoetically appropriate since it envisioned someone’s head nodding off into slumber, but just barely such that there was still borderline consciousness. It is in that moment when…
Going to Hospital Today will be my second day visiting Kim in the Scripps Hospital in LaJolla, arguably one of the best hospital complexes in the world. Those visits and wandering those largely cavernous and vacant halls set me to thinking about what goes on in hospitals. I suspect that now, during this continued Pandemic, most of us are doing our best to stay as far away from hospitals as we can. That is far…
Aiming for 2060 Today marks the 105th birthday of my mother, Dr. Ludmilla Ann Uher Prosdocimi Marin Jenkins. If she had not died at age 100 four and a half years ago, my mother would have turned 105 today….or maybe Thursday. It seems that in 1916 it took two days in Lansing, Nëw York for a birth to be properly registered, so while born on September 14th, her official life commenced on September 16th. That…
Apollo 13 Last night I watched for the umpeenth time, this Ron Howard film about the troubled flight to the moon manned by Jim Lovell, Jack Swigert (last minute replacement for Ken Mattingly) and Fred Haise. The roles were played by Tom Hanks, Kevin Bacon (Gary Sinise) and Bill Paxton. Ed Harris plays Gene Kranz, the Flight Director at Mission Control in Houston. Every time I rewatch a movie I see new things or think…
Handy Rich Ever since we came back from our summer cross-country trip, Handy Brad and I have modified our arrangement. I think this was a combination of Brad getting some other work in his neighborhood for an older woman (i.e. someone who was not so penny-pinching as some of his other retiree neighbors) and me running low on new projects. Now, if I need Handy Brad for something, I call him and we agree on…
Letting Go We got back to the hilltop today. The continental winds were with us today and we made it to San Diego about forty minutes earlier than expected. All of that meant that even with checked baggage, we made it home before noon with some Taco Bell in tow for good measure. This was, by any measure, a short absence from the hilltop. The last time we left this summer by car, we returned…
Snap Out of It! My son-in-law, John, just sent a Facebook post asking for lines that fans can easily identify with a favorite movie. My favorite movie (determined long ago as such) is Moonstruck. It stars Cher, Nicholas Cage, Danny Aiello, Vincent Gardenia, Olivia Dukakis, and a host of great character actors. My favorite line from the movie (and there are so many noteworthy lines from which to choose) is when Cher slaps Nicholas Cage…
Drinking the Drink If we talk the talk and walk the walk, do we drink the drink? I believe I do. My relationship with alcohol is a strange one. Like most people, my awareness of alcohol significantly predates my consumption of it. Also like most every kid, I snuck a sip or two of beer, wine and even the hard stuff when I was young. I had just enough to know that I didn’t like…