Category: Current Events

A CHAPTER OF RUSSIAN HISTORY (PART I OF II)

FEBRUARY 19, 2023 – Today I didn’t attempt to ski. I risked life and limb slipping, sliding and otherwise navigating a course to “Little Switzerland” to confirm that I couldn’t ski without risking life and limb. Between audible cursing and intense concentration to stay upright, I considered proposals for the subject of today’s post. Since …

CRANKED-UP

FEBRUARY 18, 2023 – My mood took a hit today when I discovered that iced-over “Little Switzerland” remains a big fail for skiing.  My attitude plunged further after I examined a Venn Diagram of three news items. The first was a one-year review of Putin’s War—a brutal, pointless outrage spawned by a dictator’s megalomania and …

HULLABALLOON

FEBRUARY 10, 2023 – Much has been made of the Chinese surveillance balloon that recently floated across the United States and was finally shot down over the coast of South Carolina. Most—though my no means all—of the “hullaballoon” was launched by indignant Republicans and their official megaphones. Why not? After all, they had what appeared …

THE WAR

JANUARY 31, 2023 – After nearly a year into the Russian war against Ukraine, I’m amazed that any people or buildings are still standing in the second largest (geographically) country in Europe. Russia’s brutal assault, prompted by delusions of imperial grandeur and fed by the age-old Russian tactic of quantity over quality, seems destined to …

ARCHIVED PRINCIPLES

JANUARY 21, 2021 – Recently, a college friend with academic credentials deeper than the seven layers of Troy uncovered a volunteer opportunity with the National Archives Citizen Archivist Project. The task involves transcribing old documents. As a PhD anthropological archeologist, he’s eminently qualified. In his email about it he wrote, “Transcribing some of these records …

(GO DEMOCRACY!)

JANUARY 18, 2023 – This morning I took a quick look at the latest “news”: arraignment of a Massachusetts man indicted on charger of killing his wife and moving the body; another shoot-’em-up in [fill in one (or several) of the 50 states]; compulsive liar accused of more lies and given Congressional committee assignments; another …

THE RARE WITHIN THE COMMONPLACE

JANUARY 9, 2023 – Last night I experienced my usual kaleidoscope of dreams. In one segment, I was leading my wife on a chase through the back, cluttered offices of a bank. Our objective was to cash a check. She wore an N95 mask, but I’d forgotten mine, so I held my breath as we …

THE BETTER ANGELS OF OUR NATURE

NOVEMBER 11, 2022 – If we look back on this day 104 years ago—originally Armistice Day; “Veterans Day” after June 1, 1954—the great rising and falling powers of Europe, drained of blood and purpose, called a halt to the mutual mayhem and destruction that had decimated an entire generation. Along the way, Russia was turned …

WATER, WATER EVERYWHERE

SEPTEMBER 29, 2022 – No, this isn’t much about the meteorological calamity that recently befell parts of Florida. What the hurricane reveals to me, however, is how much there is to know about . . . everything, and how little I’ll ever know about anything. I remember the feeling—shared by most book browsers—of entering a …

BLAHS, BLUES, AND ARGH!

SEPTEMBER 24, 2022 – Blogger’s note: Perhaps it’s a good sign that 32 days post-transplant, I’m now able to be cranky with reckless abandon. (Trigger warning: take this post with a grain of salt.) Today between rainy periods, I got myself out of the house and hiked for an hour, including hill climbs at “Little …

CIRCLE OF PARROTS

SEPTEMBER 23, 2022 – When I was a corporate warrior, a fellow lieutenant remarked periodically that we were in trouble—again—because our corporate general believed his own (latest) “press release.” I think of that observation when I hear today’s circle of parrots—leaders of a major political party, personalities on a popular cable news channel, and followers/supporters …

GOLF DAY AND ROE V. WADE

JULY 19, 2022 – Late yesterday morning I hiked to my make-believe scale model of “Europe’s Rooftop.” (Actually, it’s (still) a local, hilly, municipal golf course.) Switzerland was abandoned, which I figured was because of extreme heat. Rather than exercise good judgment, I pretended I was an alpinist. With ski poles I “scaled” the (60-foot-high) …

ADVERSITY AND ADVERTISEMENTS

JANUARY 18, 2022 – My path is rocky but overshadowed by the suffering of worthier souls. Suddenly, I’m racing down a superhighway of collective pain, and I wonder . . .What’s the purpose and destination of such an expressway? I grip the wheel so hard it breaks from the steering column. Upon the high-speed obstacle …

“NO” TO “BELOW LEVEL” . . . AND TO SAILING ON A LEVEL KEEL

JANUARY 16, 2022 – Another direct lesson of serious disease is how it affects my response to “the news.” Overcrowded ERs overshadow the prospect of Putin invading Ukraine; revised CDC recommendations on masking supersedes the growing, apparent rivalry between Governor DeSantis and You-Know-Who for the 2024 Republican Presidential Nomination; bare grocery shelves because of Covid-related …

PERFECTLY OCD IN AN IMPERFECT WORLD

DECEMBER 31, 2021 – As the world crawls to the finish of 2021, Covid continues its rampage. For two years I’ve held strong opinions about individual and governmental responses to the ongoing crisis. Recently, however, non-scientific facts and observations of human nature have forced me to reassess. Foremost among “non-scientific facts” and “observations” is sharpened …

“CANCEL CULTURE” CANCELLATION

DECEMBER 15, 2021 – No “unified theory” exists for explaining the contradictions that define humanity. And yet . . . maybe a central truth resides within our species. I’ve always been a true believer in Santa Claus, and I’m scandalized by people who would punch him in the face.  Today’s issue of The New York …

CAN EXTREME WEATHER SAVE US?

DECEMBER 12, 2021 – When I saw the photos of destruction in the path of The Great Tornadoes, I wondered if we can find common ground in the wake of such wholesale destruction; ground from which can sow and cultivate a modicum of unity that has eluded us for nearly a generation.  Perhaps a nation …

WHAT’S HAPPENING . . . AND WHAT’S NOT

DECEMBER 9, 2021 – Recently I gained some investment guidance and insight into politics when I visited . . . the doctor. After dispensing with medical advice my doc answered a general question about the Omicron variant. He’s highly educated, well-read, well-informed. In both mainstream media and medical literature, he’d read the latest news on …

UNITED WE STOOD

DECEMBER 7, 2021 – Veterans Day was originally “Armistice Day,” marking the end of the “Great War for Civilization” (I kid you not—that’s what the victors dubbed it, despite the four years of criminal slaughter—all sides—of the men of a whole generation)—at the eleventh hour of the eleventh day of the eleventh month of 1918. …

HIGHER THINKING

DECEMBER 5, 2021 – If you try you can remember our ignoble exit from Afghanistan.  If you try harder, you can remember our failure in Vietnam. Between those fiascos? The fight in Iraq—our effort at “nation-building” and . . . the rise of ISIS. Yesterday, I flipped through the latest issue of my college alumni …