Home Town Heroes Kim and Lennie put on a show last night. One from Indiana and one from Missouri, giving tribute to their home states and all the song writers that came from, lived in or happened through their home states. They also indulged their mutual love for New York City and its vast array of song material, by singing a few of those tunes as well. I would like to take a moment…
Compromising Compromises In almost every corner of modern life there are reasons to compromise rather than stick dogmatically to a strong and extreme position. This issue itself can be a very debatable one and some will say that compromise on the most important issues is unacceptable and morally repugnant. If only the world was always so black and white, life would be a lot less morally conflicted. I remember in high school, I attended…
Born to be Wild Every once in a while I see some sort of special event that catches my fancy. A few weeks ago I stumbled on an online ad for a one-night-only 50th anniversary showing of Easy Rider at Radio City Music Hall. It’s actually 50 years, two months and six days since the first day of release of the movie on July 14th, 1969, Bastille Day. Fifty years is a long time.…
Batter Up A funny thing happened on the way to the office. It turns out that this summer, the world has decided that it likes hydrogen again. That’s an understatement based on the 200-page report issues by the International Energy Agency (IEA). They say hydrogen is once again the darling it was a decade ago and a decade before that. Funny thing is that hydrogen is the most plentiful element in the universe, and…
My Two Cents I just finished watching To Sir with Love with Sidney Poitier on TCM. It’s a great movie, not because of the acting or even the script. It’s a great movie because of the messages of diversity, social awareness, the value of education, and how good teachers can change lives. I wish I could teach young high school kids. I’ve wanted to do that for years, but I’ve never figured out how…
World at War I am not talking about the fact that Iran flawlessly executed a drone attack on a major Saudi oil hub. I am not talking about President Trump simultaneously saying that he is anti-war and saying he is locked and loaded against Iran. I am not talking about Kim Jung Un rubbing his hands in glee even though he has never been to either Iran or Saudi Arabia, whispering to his robotic…
Forever Young When I wake up each morning, I take stock in how I feel. I’m pretty sure everyone does some form of this assessment consciously or subconsciously. This morning it has been conscious. To begin with, I awoke at 5:18 after sleeping since 11pm. My conscious mind said I should go back to sleep for another hour. When I awoke next at 5:34 I knew it that was all she wrote. I have…
Only the Lonely My weekend theme is loneliness for some reason. We all know that older people get lonely as the rest of the world carries on with it’s busy schedule. They seek out ways to stem that tendency, but it’s not clear to what end. While it always remains that people are all different, I tend to think that as we age we have less tolerance to exchange comfort for adventure or companionship. Some…
The Small Chill You may recall that in July, I shared a story about my old college friend Rob taking his own life. Today was the day his family decided to hold the memorial service at Rob’s home in rural Connecticut. Seven of us who went to Cornell with Rob decided to go (actually Rob, Laurey, Jeff, Ronnie, Cliff and I went to Cornell and Linda might as well have gone to Cornell since she…
What, Me Worry? It was 1967 at Hebron Academy in south-central Maine. This small, but respected prep school was a dead ringer for the school in Dead Poets Society and I was attending as a freshman. I had somehow lucked into a single room on the third-floor northwest corner but there were another twenty freshmen boys on the floor and one teacher/proctor, Mr. Beauchamp. He was no Robin Williams, Captain, my Captain. He was…