The Bestselling of America I just saw this week’s New York Times listing of the top Bestsellers in the non-fiction category in America. The top four books on the list were all pretty much newcomers with three having only one week on the list and the fourth having been on for only its second week. I’m not sure whether that’s normal or unusual, but what does strike me about the top four books is that…
Feeling Better In my morning review of my normal news feeds, I happened upon an article in Apple News about a 77-year-old bodybuilder named Joan. It seems that she has become somewhat of an Instagram influencer under the heading “trainwithjoan”. Apparently, back when she was 70 or so, she was a bit of a physical mess, declining rapidly into old age and decrepitude…like us all. That was when her daughter, who is a fitness buff,…
Vaxxed Up It’s that time of year again as we head into the Fourth Quarter. There are lots of things that start up at this time of year, but arguably the most important thing to pay attention to is that its time to update all our vaccinations. This year has been a little different than in the past. The last few years its been about getting that damn COVID vaccine and the booster as soon…
Medieval Times When we recently went east for my son Thomas’ wedding, my cousin-in-law Nancy brought me a book she had salvaged from my Ithaca house last year before everything either went out to the estate auction house or the trash. I have worked hard for two years now to get over the circumstances of my exit from that house of mine for 26 years, and I think I am mostly there. But every once…
Generational Warfare I first became aware of the Middle East tensions in 1968. I was on an Italian Line ocean liner heading to Rome to live, and the ship was packed with Americans returning to the region after their summer home leaves or whatnot. The region I refer to was entirety of the Mediterranean area and most of the Middle East and North Africa. Remember that in 1968 the U.S. burgeoning multinational corporations were heavily…
The Big Lie You have to hand it to Donald Trump, he has a habit of always aspiring to be at the top of whatever hill he chooses to climb. Of course, the more accurate way to characterize that would be to say that he always aspires to declare that he is at the top of whatever hill he chooses to say he has climbed. I’m sure the subtlety of what I’m differentiating there is…
Betty Girl In the past three years I have written 10 stories with the name Betty in them and yes, they have all been about our little white senior rescue pup who we got in 2020 from a place called Frosted Faces. I suspect, unfortunately, that this may be the last story I write about Betty. Betty seems to be in her end game today. She has not been eating her food, or most of…
Life As Imperfection I go down my share of rabbit holes while I empty my online inbox every morning. I am always on a kick to unclutter that inbox by unsubscribing from various emails and spam, but for one reason or another, like for most people, miscellaneous emails still find their way into or back into the inbox. If I am not in any particular rush at that moment or on that morning (like today,…
The Majesty of Place There is a line from America the Beautiful that we all know that goes “For purple mountains majesties…”. We all know the song written by Katherine Lee Bates in 1895 (originally called Pikes Peak). She was an English professor at Wellesley College and she wrote the song while taking a cross-country trip to Colorado. When she looked out at the wonders she could see from Pikes Peak, the words flowed into…
Babies, Puppies & Vets There’s an old saying in politics that the things you never screw around with in a negative way are babies, puppies and vets. What’s that about? Those are things everyone…everyone… is sympathetic to, so you simply do not fuck with them, or if you do, you make damn sure no one else knows about it. Who doesn’t like babies? They’re innocent and helpless. Politicians make a point about kissing babies for…