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…
New York, Nëw York Tonight we flew into JFK on JetBlue from San Diego. Any way you slice it, that is a full day travel affair. We’ve been spending a lot of time thinking about reengaging with air travel and how we feel about it. While Kim hears all my thoughts on the topic, I don’t want to assume that her thoughts on the subject are the same as mine. I think we all have…
See You Around Campus It is the first day of school and I have on a suit and a nice dress shirt (no tie, thank you, for even on Wall Street, ties are very passé and mark you as an anachronism). But I believe this is my second time wearing one of my 15 remaining suits in the past two years. You know the two reasons for that. The first is COVID. I have had…
Taming the Hillside This week I am coming to the end of a progression of man versus nature. I don’t like to think that I have triumphed over nature because that would be a foolish perspective. Nature always wins in the end. It would also be foolish because this effort is all about finding ways to embrace nature and revel in it. But I cannot completely avoid feeling like I have wrestled some aspects of…
Juggling Being a Baby Boomer, I generally have a confusion (not so much a barrier as true confusion) over gender fluidity. I identify as him/he if I must declare, but I have yet to include that on any proper titling or letterhead the way it is becoming standard for people in the groove of modernity. My youngest son is producing a short play that is entirely about a very gender fluid situation with a gender-bimodal…
It’s Raining, It’s Pouring Here we are in the middle of August and I’m putting on extra clothes for warmth. That’s right, its turned suddenly downright chilly on the hilltop at 62 degrees. It will be in the 90’s again next week, so I’m just going to enjoy it. Naturally, this was the day I planned for a team of laborers under the direction of Handy Brad to lay out the DG paths and spread…
Made in the Shade I am half Slovak and half Italian in origin. Since I was raised by my mother and like to think that I am following more in her footsteps than those of my father, I always feel more Slovak than Italian. That said, I did live in Rome, Italy for three years of high school, a very formative period in anyone’s life and I do more-or-less speak Italian. I am very comfortable…
Every Which Way But Sideways It’s Sunday night and today was a very lazy day on the hilltop for both Kim and me. I put in some time on my expert case and before I knew it it was almost 10am on another perfect San Diego summer morning. Mid-80’s with lots of sun and no humidity (ho-hum, just the usual). My agenda was to get the plants I bought yesterday down the hillside to the…
Shortening Life For years we all lived with the fears of the two-headed health monster snatching us before our prime. While it is probably hard to deny that both heart disease and cancer are strongly genetically-linked, I always considered heart disease to be a lifestyle disease and cancer a genetically-predispositioned disease. I can almost hear the uncomfortable rustling of people who immediately disagree with my characterization for some personal experiential reason. We all have friends…
A Secret Failure They say that success has many fathers, but failure is an orphan. I’m going to guess that nobody who is reading this story has ever bothered to figure out who first uttered that phrase. It is one of those pithy credos that gets made into posters and etched into rocks that are sold to people to hold down papers on their desk with all the other kitschy things they’ve accumulated over their…