Every morning, Kim spends her time with her puzzles. People are drawn to puzzles for a surprisingly rich mix of reasons. The most obvious one is the satisfaction of solving something. There’s a genuine dopamine hit when pieces of a puzzle click together or you crack a solution. It’s one of the few activities in life with clear, achievable “wins” that you fully control. There is also the mindful escape aspect of puzzling. Puzzles demand…
Yes, today is my 72nd birthday and I feel great. I am two years older than my father was when he died and the same age as my maternal grandfather when he died (in an accident), but still 28 years shy of the age goal that my mother attained. I’m sitting here thinking about my day and find myself thinking about how fortunate I am and how good I feel about my life at this…
I first went to Catalina Island in 2005 with Kim to meet her family. Catalina Island is a beautiful destination off the Southern California coast, 22 miles southwest of Los Angeles in the Pacific Ocean. It’s main town is Avalon (population ~4,000), nestled in a small harbor on the protected northeast side (facing the mainland). Access to the island is via ferry from Long Beach, San Pedro, Dana Point, or Newport Beach and it is…
It’s been a while since I’ve written about my weight loss program, so I thought an update was in order. I am now about four months into my Zepbound journey and just finish bed my 10mg dose allotment. That means I an two thirds of the way through what they say is a 22% average weight loss program. I am currently 12% down in weight, so a bit further than half way there. While on…
My youngest son Thomas now lives in Denver. There are lots of reasons that he and his wife moved there last year, but one of the big reasons I suspect is ent many young people gravitate to Colorado…for the skiing. All three of my children were raised on spending their winters skiing, mostly in Park City, Utah, where I kept a ski house for fifteen years. In my day, I used to spend 35-45 days…
I have struggled to write about the events that unfolded over the weekend in Minneapolis. The brutal and unwarranted killing of Alex Pretti is all over social media and shows no signs of leaving the news cycle any time soon. In fact, the political fallout from the killing of Pretti has been so severe and bipartisan that it now seems that Trump is finally backing down in a way that he was not prepared to…
The history of American public service reflects the nation’s ambivalence about government itself. On the one hand, we consider public service essential and laudatory at many times, and yet it is also often distrusted. From a few hundred employees in 1789 to millions today, the transformation mirrors America’s evolution from agricultural republic to industrial to information age superpower, with public servants adapting to meet each era’s challenges while maintaining democratic values. The evolution of American…
I read an article yesterday about a speed painter that paints giant canvases of Christ. She has become a favorite of Donald Trump and her name is Vanessa Horabuena. It’s an interesting name because the name essentially means “at a good/fortunate hour”—a propitious moment or good timing—which when used as a surname likely expressed hopes for fortune and good luck for the family line. What is speed painting, you ask (or, at least, I asked)?…
I can’t see more than 100 feet this morning on account of a heavy and foreboding fog that has enveloped our hilltop. It’s a pretty normal January day here in San Diego with the high temperature expected to be about 60 with the morning starting out in the low 50s. There is really nothing to complain about weather wise. That’s not the case for most of the rest of the country, where the temperatures have…
At last! Someone has finally said what the whole rational world has been thinking. We finally have a new hero in Mark Carney, the Prime Minister of Canada. At the Davos World Economic Forum, Carney delivered a succinct and inspiring 30 minute speech that brought the collective audience of politicians, national leaders, corporate chieftains, and members of the global power elite to their feet in a standing ovation. These are the moments that define history…