Automotivation When I turned sixteen I lived in Rome, Italy and all I cared about mechanically were motorcycles. I was on my third off of four high school motorcycles (a Gilera 125) and cars were an afterthought. What motivated me at that age was two-wheeled vehicles with names like Gilera, Triumph, Laverda, Moto Guzzi and Ducati. When I was applying to colleges, one of the biggest reasons I liked Stanford was that as a freshman…
Ribbit I have had an episodic relationship over the years with frogs. As a kid who spent six of his first seven years of life in the tropics, frogs were a daily part of life. I’m sure they were all over the place in Venezuela, but where I remember first encountering them with high frequency was in that little tropical valley in Costa Rica, where we lived for two years. I’m not being entirely accurate…
Kennedy Gone Mad I just watched a YouTube video of a debunking of an interview by Joe Rogan of RFK Jr.. It was a great reminder of what I respect and don’t respect in human thinking. It has long been a head-scratcher for me when you hear MAGA people denigrate liberals for being over-educated elitists. I was raised to believe that education was not just a good thing, it was a necessary thing and a…
Light Up The Town About seven years ago, Kim spent the summer in her home town of Wabash, Indiana putting on a show at the local arts center. A dozen years before she had put on another show in Wabash called Wait Til You Get To Wabash, which was written and scored by her old choir director at her local church, Suzy Jones. That original show was about the town being formed by the westward…
Modern Family It’s that time of year when we all gather as families on one occasion or another. I know fewer and further traditional families and then today I see that there is a new sitcoms being aired this season that is based on how to make a divorce work successfully for you. I am the product of divorce and Kim comes from a more traditional nuclear family, but none of that causes or prevents…
The Third Prophet I haven’t thought a lot about AI since I stopped teaching last semester. I realize that Chat GPT may provide a better means of searching the internet for information, but even though I have it downloaded, I usually still just use Google search. Then, over the past week I have read about Sam Altman getting booted from Open AI. Over the past fifty years I have read a lot of stories of…
Thanksgiving I have written many times about the importance of giving thanks for all we are fortunate enough to have in our lives. This is not a trivial thought or gesture, but rather a core belief in the importance of humility and the recognition that we all must be thankful for all the good things we have in our lives and recognize that while we can contribute to their existence, we are all, for the…
Green Drink I have spent years grimacing when people buy or blend a green drink with all it’s supposed healthful attributes and then down it like it is the nectar of the Gods. I suppose it always seemed like a healthy drink since it was green and green connotes vegetables and stuff that is good for you. That was never reason enough for me to want to drink it, so I just assumed it was…
The Layers of Life Life goes on around us at all times whether we are paying attention or not. It is very hard to say how engaged we should be with every aspect of it at any given moment. I use the differences at the moment between my friend Mike and myself as an example. It is 8am and I am listening to Jose Diaz-Balart on MSNC while I am writing this story. When I…
Babbitt Today we went to the La Jolla Playhouse to see another play on our season subscription. The Playhouse put the play on in its largest theater, presumably because the starring role was held by Matthew Broderick, the actor that brought us first War Games and then, his most famous role in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Since his fame in the 80’s, Broderick has done some other notable work like in Mel Brooks’ The Producers,…