Original anecdotes, commentary, rumination, and occasional pontification.
FEBRUARY 18, 2025 – (Cont.) If Dad had shared any of Mother’s misgivings about my decision to gallivant around the world until the money ran out, he hadn’t let on. I think his acquiescence in my plans stemmed from a combination of his knowing I was determined to follow through on my ambitions and his …
FEBRUARY 12, 2025 – (Cont.) Now comes the third piece contributing to my “crisis of perception”: the Grand Dismantling of American government—conducted at breakneck speed with chainsaws and giant meat cleavers. The process is too deep, too broad, however, to examine fully in real time—or on this blog site. My readers—left, right and center—know the …
FEBRUARY 11, 2025 – (Cont.) Better than a year ago I expressed concern about how Trump 2.0 might unfold very differently from Trump 1.0. The latter was a clown circus starring Mike Flynn, Paul Manafort, Don Jr., Eric and others, not to mention the Charlatan in Chief himself, along with dark wingmen such as Steve …
FEBRUARY 10, 2025 – (Cont.) In a nutshell, Zinn’s thesis of American history is that its essence and inevitable outcome turn on a tight combination of three inescapable determinants: (a) Whiteness, (b) male dominance, and (c) property ownership. Of course, there are layers to each of these elements and a host of influences beyond them, …
FEBRUARY 9, 2025 – (Cont.) First, let’s take those first 150 pages of the 680-page history tome. The book is A People’s History of the United States by Howard Zinn. I’m positive that several of my readers have read all 680 pages of it; that additional readers know of the book and are generally familiar …
FEBRUARY 8, 2025 – Not to be overly dramatic, but for the second time in my life I’m experiencing what I’d characterize as a “personal crisis of perception.” That’s a rather vague description, I realize, for what could be cast more definitively as a “worldview crisis” or “big picture crisis.” In any event, my first …
FEBRUARY 2, 2025 – (Cont.) Now that we’ve seen what destructive disruption we’re in for under Trump 2.0, the question, of course, is “What do we do now?” To a large extent, how that question is answered depends on where we have skin in the game. Notice, not if we have skin in the game, …
FEBRUARY 1, 2025 – (Cont.) That is, if we think we know what’s happening in the world today (under current circumstances, this means right down to the hour), what’s likely to happen in future weeks, months, even years? Since November 5, and especially since January 20, the commentators I follow and the people with whom …
JANUARY 31, 2025 – At any moment in the course of human events, every member of society faces three basic big-picture questions: What’s happening? Based on what’s happening, what’s likely to happen in the future? How can and should one try to influence and adapt to what’s likely to happen? Since Trump’s inauguration, these three …
JANUARY 29, 2025 – (Cont.) If Professor Stavrou is the consummate inquisitive scholar, he is, I think a born educator in the loftiest sense of the term. He’s neither a pedant nor a pontificator but a man intensely dedicated to intellectual integrity and the joy of learning. Given his unusually lengthy career as both a …
JANUARY 24, 2025 – I apologize for what’s become a work-week-long rant over politics. Don’t worry, though: as a modern member of the species, I have a short attention span. In short order another barking dog will rattle my cage, capture my fleeting thoughts and pin them down until the next wildfire, school shooting, extreme …
JANUARY 22, 2025 – We’ve all experienced in life days of unsettled and unsettling weather, in which several decks of angry clouds sail overhead like massive fleets of warships plying the high seas. Driven on a mortal mission, they grant no reprieve from gloom and despair. At times the overhead seas darkens suddenly in portent …
JANUARY 19, 2025 – As the world prepares for the improbable second inauguration of a flam-flam artist[1] gone so apparently legit, he garnered a majority of the popular vote for president of—get this—the United States of America, land of the free, home of the brave, domain of the eagle, and once a beacon for “[the] …
JANUARY 18, 2025 – Recently, I watched a Netflix documentary about the mind-boggling effort to build, launch and deploy James Webb. Of course, I’m not referring to the second NASA administrator by that name but the largest telescope ever built (by earthlings) and named in honor of him. The documentary reminded me of what I’ve …
JANUARY 14, 2025 – Last Sunday my wife and I took our nine-year-old granddaughter to a play at the renowned Children’s Theater Company (CTC) adjacent to the Minneapolis Institute of Arts. While we wandered around the lobby waiting for the theater doors to open, I noticed the “Land Acknowledgment” posted off to the side. It …
JANUARY 12, 2025 – After blowin’ smoke, as I’m doing most of the time, today I broke from the mold and blew some snow. Overnight in these parts we received our third measurable snowfall of another wimpy winter. “Measurable” is a relative term; maybe an inch and a half, if you use you an elastic …
JANUARY 10, 2025 – Lately, each morning while I consume my porridge,[1] I pore over a coffee-table-size book bearing the expansive title, History of the World Map by Map. It’s as much an historical atlas as it is a sweeping narrative of epochs and empires, movements and migrations that have shaped the world of homo …
JANUARY 9, 2025 – I hadn’t intended to tune into Jimmy Carter’s funeral this morning—televised from end-to-end—at the National Cathedral. After all, I had important things to do (skiing) and important places to go (up and down “St. Moritz” in “Little Switzerland,” the regional park a mile from our house) . . . once I’d …
JANUARY 8, 2025 – (Cont.) Under the mistaken assumption that life was good, I attempted to reconnect the main part of the Dyson with its long wand and floor brush roller. This action, however, ended nirvana abruptly: When I snapped the wand into its docking station on the combination handle/motor/filter/canister, the bottom of the canister …
JANUARY 2, 2025 – To stay out of trouble . . . or to get myself into trouble, I’m not sure which . . . I mentor a couple of freshmen writing students at Southwest High School, ranked second among 36 public high schools in Minneapolis. I’m one of a group of volunteer mentors who …
DECEMBER 31, 2024 – In so many ways, personally and publicly, this year—2024—has been the year of the Yowzers, though every year has its fair share of Yowzers. On the personal front, the biggest Yowzer was our oldest son’s descent into the heart of darkness—and out again—in the heart health department. Nothing brings more intense …
DECEMBER 30, 2024 – President Jimmy Carter was such a nice guy, people said so long before he died at the ripe young age of 100. As people reflect on his exemplary life, I have a few memories of my own about him. The first was the mock Democratic Presidential Nominating Convention held at my …
DECEMBER 28, 2024 – Late yesterday evening I stumbled across an extraordinary film, which I highly recommend to my readers. First are four things to know about it: FIRST: It’s among the sub-genre of World War II movies that doesn’t depict weapons of war (e.g. The Edge of War; The Wannsee Conference (see 12/26/22 post); …
DECEMBER 27, 2024 – This evening I finished watching Darkest Hour, directed by Joe Wright and featuring Gary Oldman in the role of Winston Churchill. Oldman won an Oscar for Best Actor for his extraordinary performance in this historical drama. I’d read quite a lot about Churchill—his harrowing experiences as a soldier and war correspondent …
DECEMBER 24, 2024 – This morning my wife announced that she’d found tucked away in the very back of her underwear drawer[1], a neat stash of letters that our two sons had written to Santa Claus back in ancient times. Of course I wanted to see it—the stash of letters, I mean. They reflected a …