Getting Out of Dodge Today we drove from Gallup, New Mexico to Dodge City, Kansas on our way to Kansas City tomorrow. You all remember Dodge City with Marshall Matt Dillon (James Arness), Doc (Millburn Stone), Chester (Dennis Weaver) and Miss Kitty (Amanda Blake) with her Long Branch Saloon. You might also remember the scruffy guy who seemed like a town bum, but would occasionally get deputized. That was Festus (Ken Curtis), who was not…
Rejection Angst Many of us guys have had a lifetime of experience with rejection and should presumably be somewhat immune to it as we reach our retirement years. Not really. It’s not that I fear rejection or anticipate it and thereby avoid situations where it might arise, but when it finds its way to me, I simply don’t like it. Who would? But I keep thinking that I am past needing external validation, and that…
The Day Before the Day Today is a perfect San Diego June day. The sun rose at 5:38am and there was no June Gloom marine layer of mist or fog. The high is projected to be 75 degrees with a humidity level of 50%. By the time the sun sets at 8pm, making today the longest daylight day of the San Diego year, we will be ready for our roadtrip. Technically, the longest day should…
Boosted A few days ago Kim asked me what I thought about the idea of getting our second COVID booster shot before we started our drive back to the East Coast on Sunday. My first thought was to check quickly on Google how long one should wait after having a COVID infection before one gets and injection of a vaccine that puts more antigens of the Coronavirus into one’s blood stream. The quick research was,…
As the Mist Lifts It’s June on the hilltop and that generally means that every morning starts out looking misty or fog-bound. June gloom and all that. Some mornings it takes a few hours for the mist to lift and some mornings, like today, the mist sort of gradually rolls out towards the Ocean and the hilltop gets clear and sunny before 9am. All that mist accumulates in the night because the evenings and sunsets…
Eyelids of Morning I am feeling tired this morning. My CPAP tells me I slept 6 hours and 39 minutes last night, which excludes the half hour I was awake at 3am, taking some Tylenol for my aching shoulder and reading a few emails. At that time of day there are usually only junk spam emails and one important email with Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters From An American, her daily recap of how the events…
Home Stretch This is reunion weekend at my Alma Mater. I matriculated at Cornell in 1971, so 51 years ago, and graduated with my BA in Economics and Government in 1975 (47 years ago) and with my MBA in Finance in 1976 (46 years ago). I have often noted that it seems wrong that we are forced to decide at age 18, 20, 22 or even 25 what we want to do for the rest…
Worlds Colliding Writing is something I find very soothing to do. I was recently so upset about an incident involving gun laws and some people I know who are involved at the most sordid end of the gun manufacturing business, that I wrote a story denouncing the whole affair and sent it to a subgroup of related friends for consideration. The reaction I got back was difficult for me. I spent a moment wearing a…
Advice and Nonsense I mentioned in my recent Into Thin Air story that I was heading to my local REI (Recreational Equipment, Inc.) store to buy rock climbing gear for my latest rock climbing wall project. I mentioned that I would be seeking their advice, but I had no idea what a tale that would become all by itself. I have been to REI and survived that experience, coming out with about 75% of what…
Downhill Racer Last night I made Kim watch A History of Violence, the 2005 film directed by David Cronenberg and staring Vigo Mortensen, Maria Bello, Ed Harris and William Hurt. While Cronenberg leans more to the macabre and gory than I generally prefer, I have always like Vigo and there is always something appealing about the guy who wants to be at peace but gets dragged back into his violent past by circumstance (John Wick,…