Original anecdotes, commentary, rumination, and occasional pontification.
MARCH 18, 2025 – Yesterday evening in the company of my two history-hungry friends, I attended yet another amazing two-hour lecture (no breaks) by the inimitable Russian history scholar, Professor Theofanis Stavrou. With his usual enthusiasm he delivered his far-reaching deep-diving tightly organized well-sourced exposition. His notes were on the lectern, but he never consulted …
MARCH 7, 2025 – The past 24 hours brought a whirlwind of encounters that gave me much to ponder. First was an email from our good Czech friend Pavel—the same inimitable Dr. Šebesta whose letter from 44 years ago was the subject of my 2/24/2025 post. Embedded in his email was a link to Prime …
MARCH 4, 2025 – I understand that earlier this evening Trump delivered the longest State of the Union address in 60 years. Many of us chose not to tune in, and I can say with robust confidence that our decision was the right one. In the bubble I shared with four others over a delightful …
FEBRUARY 25, 2025 – In these times especially, a person needs daily diversions that aren’t injurious to the body or soul—or more positively stated, activities that promote mental and physical health. Since the turn of the year, I’ve been hauling self and ski gear over to “Little Switzerland” every day but the four that I …
FEBRUARY 24, 2025 – (Cont.) The fourth letter from February 1981 in the packet that Russ sent me exactly 44 years later was from (now) Dr. Pavel Šebesta, the inimitable Czech, to whom I introduced the readers in “Stage IV” (2/19/25 post) of this series. Pavel’s letter came in a large light brown envelope bearing …
FEBRUARY 22, 2025 – (Cont.) The day before [January 12, 2025], while my sister Jenny was visiting our cousin Russ and his wife Kerri in California, they came across a letter that my grandfather had written to the Winthers back in June 1933. Russ emailed a scanned version to my other two sisters and me. …
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 …