You Princes of Maine One of the things I enjoy about when Gary and Oswaldo come to visit us, as they have the past few days, is that there is a ritual we go through every evening to find a good movie that everyone will enjoy. For some reason, what is a challenging situation (meaning the selection of an agreeable movie to watch) for just Kim and me, seems never to be difficult for the…
The Noble Hector In Greek mythology, Hector was the son of Priam of Troy and was that city’s greatest warrior as the Trojan Prince. Troy is in modern day Turkey and was the first stop we made on our last international motorcycle trip through that exotic and lovely country that seems to be systematically being destroyed by its authoritarian leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Erdoğan has run turkey as either President or Prime Minister for almost…
A Birthday for the Ages I have been saying I am 68 years old for the better part of the year. I am not sure why I do that, but I always declare my age as the next birthday I am expecting. I have never been afraid of aging, though I probably should be. There isn’t a day that goes by that I don’t feel a full share of aches and pains, even though I…
Trust as a Four Letter Word We have a convention in this country that only partially or barely exists in many other countries. We buy life insurance. Initially, it is sold to us (note that I say sold TO us as opposed to bought BY us or sought out BY us) as a responsible way for us breadwinners to ease our guilt with the dependence we have created for our families on our income earning…
The Mouth of Truth During high school, there were several “low hanging fruit” ways we would do what young men all over the world try to do, which was to meet young women. When you are an expat living in Rome you have several distinct advantages. The first is that there are a constant year-round flow of American young women traveling either with or without their families around Europe, and no trip to Europe is…
Getting Pickled I am writing this story on Sunday night, knowing that it will publish on Wednesday morning. That timing is relevant since when most people read this, Kim and I will be off getting pickled. Couples in retirement have many different ways of operating. In general I think it is fair to say that most couples try to balance individual activities with couples activities. It’s really not good to operate like working couples who…
Day Labor Tomorrow I will start my day by driving over to Home Depot in San Marcos and hiring two day laborers to help me advance the ball on my Hobbit House project. Today, Handy Brad came over for an hour or so and we discussed what had to happen next. He thought we were going to carry the wall frames down and attach them to the railroad tie foundation. I knew that would probably…
The New Bicoastal My head is back on Staten Island all of a sudden. I want to be careful in what I say because for the most part, we were very well treated on Staten Island and we tried to be good citizens who engaged with the community for the three years we lived there. I don’t think those were our favorite times for many reasons, some which are intertwined with the Borough and some…
Words and Pictures I have stumbled on a movie tonight that has happened at a moment when I have realized that after being ahead of myself on these stories for a dry long time, I have run the kettle dry. I just published a story for tomorrow morning and have to get a jump on Saturday’s story and then Sunday’s, etcetera, etcetera. How unusual that I should stumble on this particular movie staring Clive Owen…
Tho Tho Thore Do you remember that old superhero joke about Thor, the God of lightning and thunder that wields his mighty hammer across the heavens? He wakes up after a drunken one-night stand somewhere on the other side of the tracks in Valhalla and has the familiar awkward issue of waking up in some unknown mere mortal’s boudoir. So, he stands up and does what a Germanic God of mythology is supposed to do,…