Original anecdotes, commentary, rumination, and occasional pontification.
MARCH 20, 2020 – As “seniors,” my wife and I are of the “at risk” group for covid-19. Accordingly, with cautiously executed exceptions, we’re self-isolated. Waiting things out amidst all the knowns, unknowns, claims, data, missing data, apparently reliable information and obviously bogus information, I’ve nailed down one certainty: our imaginations thrive during a crisis. …
MARCH 18, 2020 – Yesterday, I enjoyed a long-distance conversation with Dean, one of my brothers-in-law. I introduced my blog-followers to Dean last September (see The Dean of Readers – 9/16). For newcomers, he’s wheelchair bound by multiple sclerosis. His mind, however, soars freely and far beyond his physical limitations. He and my oldest sister …
MARCH 14, 2020 – Yesterday my wife informed me that the psychic Sylvia Browne had predicted all of this—“this” being the corvid-19 pandemic. Apparently, Ms. Browne envisioned in 2008 that in 2020 a respiratory illness would rage, then disappear as quickly and mysteriously as it appeared. A decade later the contagion would reappear with a …
February 21, 2020 – I have a plan for the Democrats. It goes like this: Just before Super Tuesday, the Las Vegas “debaters” plus Steyer hold a conclave–and create a huge media buzz around it. Then on the day before the multi-state primary, they hold a prime-time press conference. The group strides in led by …
JANUARY 28, 2020 – Contrary to common assumption, not all who disdain Trump want his removal by impeachment/conviction. Why not? Vice President Pence. ’Tis far better to defeat the regime by a landslide in November. But how? By a good piece of theater, as in . . . MEANS OF REMOVAL ACT I – “SLAPSTICK” …
JANUARY 11, 2020 – It started with a paper cut. Yesterday at my office, I picked up the phone and sliced my fingertip on a sheet of paper in an untidy stack next to the phone. The tiny cut drew blood. Later, every time I pulled my mitten on or off, my finger cried, “Ouch!” …
JANUARY 3, 2020 – For Christmas my wife gave me a soup cookbook. Yesterday, I tried my luck at “Lentil Soup with Lemon.” The signature benefit of my initial soup project was heightened appreciation for people (starting with my wife) who can prepare a whole meal. Because the recipe involved vegetables, it involved chopping, and …
DECEMBER 1, 2019 – Yesterday evening while my poor wife coughed at home, I ventured to Pantages Theater in Minneapolis for Garrison Keillor’s A Prairie Home Christmas. It was a brilliant show: Rich Dworsky at the piano, with the Guy’s All-Star Shoe Band; Tim Russell and Sue Scott as “the voices”; Fred Newman at sound …
JANUARY 23, 2019 – Awhile back I was hiking across my usual terrain in Little Switzerland . . . the golf course in nearby Como Park. Near the foot of the hill I call “St. Moritz,” I encountered a lost golf ball. I know it was lost because no golfers were anywhere in sight. Initially …
SEPTEMBER 2, 2019 – Friday, while at historic Fort Snelling just outside Minneapolis, I was struck by a map of Minnesota on which just a handful of names appeared—neither of the Twin Cities (Minneapolis and Saint Paul) being among them. The map depicted important sites in the lore and history of the Dakotah Indians who …
MAY 26, 2019 – I grew up in Minnesota in the ’60s, which means I grew up on ice skates. Though I never played organized hockey, I attended a small college where in the ’70s hockey was by far the biggest sport. By the team roster, you could tell which states (and Canadian provinces) had …
MAY 24, 2019 – One day my dad came home from work and told a funny second-hand story, which means I’m making it third-hand. But if you read The Art of the Detail on this site (May 22), you’d know that Dad was a man of precision. I’m sure that in relating the story to …
MAY 14, 2019 – Yesterday afternoon I spent two-and-a-half hours holed up in a conference room with another lawyer, an accountant, and a business guy. Our goal was to agree on a number as we pored over financials, struggling to find the source of a discrepancy. By the meeting’s end, we agreed only that we …