the tattooed guy at the next machine

Come to think of it, this might be a continuation of "there's something about september", but Jerry was just commenting that days like today, weather-wise, are his favorite.  It's still warm here in the Twin Cities, but it's breezy and there is a hint of autumn, and it's just one of those days where you gotta just love life.  If only we could halt time here to this moment in September 2012.

I was thinking about that a little when I was working out at the gym a couple hours ago.  There was a youngish guy at the next machine, working his calves, and I couldn't help but notice the tattoos all the way down both legs.  The design was actually quite something, I'm sure that his tattoo artist must have been proud of his work on those perfectly toned legs.  But I'm thinking, little does this young guy know how fast the next twenty, thirty, forty years are going to go by, and as those legs age those tattoos could end up looking like droopy splashes of nothing.  When something in our lives reaches near-perfection, it's a shame we can't freeze that part of us permanently and then just work on everything else.

distractions for two whole months

Some of the speeches from the Democratic convention were great, but I'm speeched-out for a while so am glad the conventions are done.

To be dreaded over the next sixty days:  The awful political ads on TV.  It's a time to switch it off, read a book instead, or maybe just turn on the television to watch a DVD...

... except for the debates.  They could be worth watching this year, if they can be real.

helen's questions

Helen, in New Jersey, a long-time friend and regular blog-reader of mine, had two questions for me, and they made me realize that my posts occasionally leave people wondering, "Huh?".. So let me fill in some gaps.

First, she wondered, after reading my recent "seatless" posts, why the heck Jerry is flying standby?... is it that cheap?  Well, here's the deal.  He has a good friend, retired after many years with Delta and Northwest Airlines, who has given him several of her "buddy passes" (perks for being an airline employee), and they are very cheap yet can often mean being seated in first class, the downside being that you have to put up with the uncertainty of being on standby.  And he handles uncertainly better than some of the rest of us.

Next, she asked, are you and Jerry back together or not?  Well, yeah..... :-)

seatless from seattle

Jerry is finally on a plane back to Minneapolis, after sitting around at the Seattle airport waiting for two earlier planes that had no room for his standby butt.  I need to pick him up in a couple hours, which means that I need to DVR tonight's Bill Clinton speech, since I wouldn't want to miss it.  I loved Michelle Obama's speech last night.  I'm still pessimistic about the November elections, but this, the week of the Democratic National Convention, is a time to feel good -- relatively, at least.

there's something about september

As much as I always dread the end of summer, I find that those first post-Labor Day weeks bring me high energy.  It's like summer vacation is over and it's time to get back to work -- even though school days are a distant memory. I need to take advantage of the moment.

changes since 1894

Historical trivia for you:  Labor Day first became a national holiday in 1894 in a declaration signed by President Grover Cleveland, the intent being to celebrate workers and the many accomplishments of the labor movement.

Update to today -- Labor Day 2012:  Every year, you hear less and less about the "Labor" part of Labor Day, and I can't help but wonder how long it will before the plutocrats and big business, in their ongoing move to demonize labor unions, find a way to change the name of the holiday to something else.  It's appalling  how they have, through their political puppets, already convinced many lower/middle income, underemployed and underpaid voters that unions are a bad thing.

More historical trivia for you:  Organized labor was the first group to be crushed by the Fascists in Italy and the Nazis in Germany in the 1930s.

I hope you are having a good Labor Day.

seatless to seattle

Jerry is going to Seattle for a couple days to visit his friends Tomoko and Norm and is flying "standby", which means you show up at the airport and don't know if you're going to get on board or not.  The first Seattle flight was full, so he hung around the MSP airport for three more hours, and it's looking like this next flight is a go.  Have fun, Jerry.  I kind of wish I was going too, except for the standby part of it -- I'm way too insecure for such shenanigans.  Let's hope he has good luck getting a flight back.

playin' in the streets

If you go wandering the streets of downtown Minneapolis and downtown St. Paul this summer, you might be surprised to find some old, beat-up, yet artistically-revived pianos here and there, and you can just sit down and play them, like I did at the two pianos above (Photos by Tom Dixon!).  The project brought together local artists and businesses (thanks, Russ!) to add some music to downtown street life.  Okay, not all the keys work and maybe the pedals stick and the pianos overall might be a bit out of tune, but you'll find out how good it is to play in the open air.  They will just be there until the middle of September, then they go off to piano heaven, so enjoy it, as players or listeners, while you can.

The website for this great project:  PIANOS ON PARADE

there was no good

... there was just bad and ugly.

And so ends the year 2012's republican national convention, and even though I wanted to watch parts of it, just out of curiosity, I, when the time came, just couldn't stomach it.

I wouldn't mind if these people would just get up there and say what they believe, although, if they really did that, they'd get very few votes.  Instead, it's all lies and distortions, non-specific platitudes and the dumbing-down of any possible civil discourse, and I hate yelling at the TV, so I switched it off.

Apparently even Clint Eastwood bombed.

the commercial quota

I admit that I'm in a TV mood and not the the TV itself but mostly just lying here on the couch and dozing off with something in the background and at the same time I need to avoid Mitt Romney's acceptance speech, so I am zipping all over OnDemand and my recorded DVR stuff.  And, as I am watching The Big Bang Theory and fast-forwarding through the commercials, I am noticing once again what a large percentage of a half-hour show is made up of commercials! Didn't this stuff used to be regulated by the FCC?  Did Congress override?

how james is doing, an update

James, my 19-year-old nephew, (remember him?) starts his second year of college this week, and he recently observed his one-year-anniversary at his Mall of America job, so it seemed like it might be time for an update.

What a year it has been for him and for us.  He has matured, especially in the past three or four months, way more than we would have predicted.  He has become a hard worker, a good student, and a well-rounded guy.  He lives in a nice studio apartment across the park from us, has made a number of good friends and is developing goals for his life.

... and, he has started his own blog, which he has given me permission to share with you.  Click on it, see what you think:

http://greenpenguin11.tumblr.com/

Nope!  He changed the address:  http://gracefulassassin11.tumblr.com/

the fair and mostly cloudy

Twin Cities small talk every year as we get deep into August:  "So are you going to go to the Fair this year?"  The Minnesota State Fair is what they're referring to, and this year, instead of hemming and hawing, I can tell them I've already been.  Jerry and I got up early this morning and spent the mostly warm and cloudy day on the Fairgrounds.  Our advice to you if you're looking for junk food advice: skip the deep-fried Twinkies and go the the Lunch Box stand next to the DFL building and have an outstanding cinnamon roll.

august 1956: chicago, illinois

The national political conventions, held every four years to nominate presidential candidates, used to be fun to watch, sort of, at least for a geeky guy like me.  Now they are four-day coronation ceremonies for candidates that were already pre-selected... Obnoxious, to say the least.

The first convention I ever watched on TV was the 1956 Democratic National Convention, held in Chicago.  Hey, don't give me that look -- I was very young at the time.  Adlai Stevenson was the candidate nominated to unseat Eisenhower, but the part of the proceedings that I remember is the entertaining campaigning and voting on the convention floor for the vice-presidential running mate.  Stevenson had thrown the selection for V.P. to the convention delegates to decide.  This was the first time I had ever heard of Senator John F. Kennedy, who was making a run for the veep role.  The vote went to three ballots (more than one ballot??.. unheard of in any convention since then), and the nomination went to Estes Kefauver (Don't you just love these names -- "Adlai"?  "Estes"?).  The Stevenson-Kefauver ticket lost to Eisenhower-Nixon, but Kennedy went on to be the presidential nominee and president four years later, in 1960.
*****
A little known fact:  Jerry went to Adlai Stevenson's funeral in July 1965 in Springfield, Illinois.  His dad was a major Stevenson fan.

isaac, son of abraham

Four years ago this week, the Republicans were having their national convention here in the Twin Cities.  It became the convention that infamously introduced Sarah Palin to the world.  Meanwhile, Hurricane Gustav was hitting Florida, while the weather here in Minnesota was balmy... perfect weather for the SWAT teams that were ready to bang the heads of us anti-war protestors.

Today, the weather here in the Minneapolis/St. Paul area is beautiful and will be so all week, and this year we will be free of those Neanderthal convention delegates.  Meanwhile, Florida, the state hosting the Republican convention this time, is being attacked by a hurricane with a Biblical name (Isaac).  Day One of the convention has already been cancelled due to the weather.

If it were the Democrats having their convention threatened by wild weather, absurdist TV-preacher Pat Robertson would be saying that it was happening because the liberals were incurring the wrath of God.  Should we take this to mean that it's the Republicans that have pissed God off instead?

ten bucks for a little diversion

It's going to be hard not to bitch for the next several days about the republican national convention, so let me go the don't-think-about-it route instead to tell you about the movie we went to see last night:

Hope Springs, starring the always-lovable Meryl Streep and the sometimes-surprising Tommy Lee Jones (surprising because he is a better actor than I realized).  It's a really small film about a troubled marriage, and you're gonna sit there for two hours hearing about why it is so troubled and what can be done to fix it.  But consider this:  it's summer and the other choices in the cineplex are special-effects monsters and bad writing and corporate rip-offs created for teenage boys whose main interaction with the world is through video games and text-messaging.

So, sit back and enjoy Streep and Jones, and you will be totally convinced that they are their characters.  It's cute, and there is something to be said for cuteness once in a while.

stupidity is forgivable,

ignorance is fixable... That's my challenge.

oh, harry!

Prince Harry, third in line for the British throne (right behind his Camilla-laden dad and his regal, all-too-perfect brother William), is in trouble again -- this time for nude pics of himself covorting with a naked female while they are playing "strip-billiards" the other day in a suite at the Wynn Hotel in Las Vegas.  My question, of course, is, what rat was taking and distributing the pictures?  And how is this shocking or anybody's business, what Harry does in private?  He is the only member of the current Royal Family who is even remotely interesting, a person you might like hanging out with!

Oh, the rough life of a prince!

finding a leon russell fan

A week from tonight, Leon Russell will be performing at the Cedar Cultural Center here in Minneapolis.  I've seen Leon twice in the past and was excited to see that he's going to be back in town -- until I realized that I probably have nobody in my life right now who would be a Leon Russell fan.  I mean, maybe I could drag Jerry along, but it wouldn't be his scene... and most current acquaintances of mine would just ask, "Who the heck is Leon Russell??"  It doesn't seem like the kind of concert you'd attend by yourself, and Leon has a voice that probably isn't for the uninitiated, so Leon might be singing to a Howardless audience.  And I'm realizing that I need to widen my circle of friends.

skinny-dipping in the sea of galilee, legitimately

The political world gets more bizarre by the day... Two Republican U.S. congressmen are in hot (or cold) water and these are top stories, and, as much as I would love to see all Republican congresspeople lose their re-election bids, I think the current flaps are overblown.

Take that guy in Missouri, for instance, who said that women don't get pregnant from "legitimate" rapes and therefore there should be no exceptions for rape victims when it comes to banning all abortions.  He was just saying what he believes:  that women should have no rights when it comes to making decisions about their own bodies.  As reprehensible a stance as that is, what's more reprehensible is the gang of Republican leaders who are condemning him for saying what they, in fact, also believe -- they just say it using different words.  Hypocrites.

In a more humorous vein, there is the congressman who is in trouble because he went skinny-dipping in the Sea of Galilee.  Come on, dudes, I bet even the disciples skinny-dipped in the Sea of Galilee now and then!  The people who are complaining about him are not so much concerned about where he did it but that he was nude anywhere.  I figure that if God had any serious issues with nudity, we wouldn't be born naked, or am I over-simplifying?

it's time to re-arrange your living room

Sometimes you need to make changes.... sometimes big changes, sometimes changes small but that affect your everyday anyway... just something different...

... like, with us -- it was to just re-arrange the whole living room... Don't go out and buy new stuff, just work with what you have.... It might just change your everyday perspective... A new angle.  It might be inspiring, it might just wake you up.

ideas i wouldn't have seen

Once again, I had "blogger" tickets for the Guthrie Theater last night, this time for an entertaining new show called Trick Boxing, told in a combination of dance, physical comedy, puppetry and even boxing moves.  I'm very grateful to the Guthrie for the past season of complimentary tickets, especially for the shows that I wouldn't have seen otherwise.  Some of these programs have opened my eyes to some of the more obscure, yet perhaps more creative, works of modern theater, and I say thanks again.  I look forward to the new season.

batman at the zoo

I finally broke down and saw the new Batman movie, The Dark Knight Rises, along with Jerry and Tom, last night in the IMAX theater at the Minnesota Zoo.  It just seemed like the thing to do, although, watching it, you can't help but think about the theater shooting in Aurora, Colorado, the night it opened and what a horrible scene that must have been.

The IMAX theater at the zoo has the largest movie screen in Minnesota and superior sound (and this is a very loud movie), so it was fun to see it there, except that the seats aren't very comfortable.

I found the story itself to be a little disturbing, though:  the "good guys" are the billionaires, the Wall Street crowd, and unarmed innocent cops, and the mobs following the "bad guy", Bane, look too much like "Occupy wannabes".  Not a good or truthful message.  If you see the film, take it for what it is -- better-than-average summer entertainment -- and don't give it a lot of thought.

why i haven't commented on paul ryan yet

... I mean, let's face it -- Considering some of the nut-jobs Mitt Romney was considering to be his running mate, if one were to choose the one with the highest IQ, it might be Paul Ryan.

He may be smart, he may be articulate, but his philosphy is so screwed up and so wrong for this country in 2012 that I don't know where to start, which is why I haven't said anything about him since Romney annointed him earlier this week. I mean, the dude is a fan of Ayn Rand!  and 95% of the people in the U.S. probably have no idea who Ayn Rand was, and they are in no mood to be educated on such matters.  And then there is Ryan's extreme and obscene budget plan....

Hence, my frustration... but lots to say.

across the street from the tiergarten

I just finished reading In the Garden of Beasts, non-fiction by Erik Larson, covering the years 1933-1934 in Berlin, just as Hitler is solidifying his grip on the German government,  as told through the experiences of the newly-appointed (by President Franklin Roosevelt) U.S. ambassador to Germany and his family.  It's a horrifying era and, as expertly told by the author, also fascinating and readable.  The ambassador and his family lived across from the Tiergarten (loosely interpreted as "the Garden of Beasts") park section of Berlin, located in the thick of the power struggles all around them.  A highly recommended book.  Makes me want to read more of the same.

howard's gardening hints #4 and final

It has occurred to me that yesterday's video of my patio plants took a long time to open, so if you didn't have the patience for that, here are a couple more glances... and, as August proceeds and everything gets more scraggly, I won't bother you with any more such pics (except for Jon, who demands them)...

and a preview of patio views to come:



howard's gardening hints #3

Today's hint... Take pictures of the plants on your patio in August so that you can remember what they looked like when winter comes....

if you knew about camels going through eyes of needles

It's a shame that the "religious right-wing" of Christianity explore the dark side of their Bible instead of the Gospels, which, it seems to me, should be the basis of what Christianity is -- the theoretical words of Jesus himself.  If they did, they wouldn't be trashing the poor, as they are in modern-day America, and glorifying the rich.  They are the Pharisees of our times, just less educated.

we want mo'

It's one of those Sunday evenings that happens every four years -- the closing ceremony of the Summer Olympics.... It's always a nostalgic moment and we wish they weren't done, but isn't it a good thing that we don't have the Olympics all the time?  I mean, I'm sure I watched more Olympics this time than I ever had before -- it fills a lot of evenings! -- and I blame that on never having seen the competitions on HD TV until this year!  It does make a difference...

My favorite moments from these Olympics:  Gymnastics, men and women; men's diving; Kevin Love of the Timberwolves being part of the gold-medal basketball team; Oscar Pistorius, the double-amputee runner from South Africa; the British runner Mo' Farah; the London setting for it all.

Quick question:  Didn't Germany used to win a lot more Olympics medals when there were two Germanys?

a big chunk of internet space

For better or for sometimes worse, today, August 11, marks my two-year anniversary -- 732 days in a row blogging.

If I'm boring you, let me know and I'll stop. Otherwise, unless my computer breaks down or Google blows up, I'll trudge on into the next year.

drinks on the rooftop

Friday night, midnight in less than an hour, so I need to sneak in a blog post..... can't break my streak -- more on that tomorrow.

Met friends Eric and Mary downtown for drinks.  They were at the Twins game and couldn't handle the thought of seeing the whole Twins game, so they texted us and we walked over to meet them somewhere.... we went up to the rooftop bar at Seven, the place over at Hennepin and 7th.  It's a beautiful evening, great for people-watching with a nighttime downtown skyline in front of us.  This is what summer should be.

suddenly, a vaccine evangelist

My friend Todd has the whooping cough!  and, man, is he miserable! He has been coughing his brains out for two weeks, has probably at least another two weeks of it, has been to the E.R., has taken antibiotics (so he should at least not be contagious anymore!), has slept very little...

Whooping cough (official name pertussis) is something that I used to hear about kids having when I was a kid, and I thought it went away:  until the recent couple years, I hadn't heard about whooping cough in decades because an effective vaccine was developed... But it's back and was even proclaimed an "epidemic" on the West Coast a year or two ago.

Todd, between coughing fits, is now preaching the word for people to get vaccinated from this awful illness, so I'm just passing the word along....

Jon's hamsters

I was kidding... Jon has gerbils, not hamsters, but it's fun to get a rise out of Jon once in a while.... and then there was the time I ate a two-year-old peanut that was intended for a gerbil... But who really wants to hear about hamsters or gerbils?  Or mice and rats, for that matter?

His fish aquariums are a more interesting deal, though.  Jon, besides being able to perfectly design his yard (and my patio), can beautifully landscape underwater too.  His aquariums, at home and at his office, are works of art.  I should post pictures of his aquariums sometime. Remind me.

resorting to cat talk again

Yesterday it was dog talk.  Today cat talk.  What next -- Jon's hamsters?

It's my sister Joan.. She is a cat freak... (and I admit that I could probably live with a cat before I could live with a dog)....

Joan's Facebook post today:  

so I look up from the couch, and there is my cat Tony hanging out the window. He had ripped out the screen and was trying to escape. We live on the 4th floor. I grabbed him though and he is ok..I  had to grab him by his hind quarters, that's the only part that wasn't out the window.

If you know Joan, you know how devastated she would be if something happened to Tony, that wild cat of hers... It's a good thing Joan happened to be at home today, a day off for her, otherwise she'd be a wreck tonight as I write this.  The last thing you want to see, looking out from your 4th floor apartment, is your cat splattered all over the sidewalk.  Or would he have landed on his feet?

the scoobert eleventh

Scoobert & Ruthie, in their younger days

I know what you're thinking:  How can he be so desperate for a post that he resorts to his niece Ruthie's dog's birthday?

And you know I'm no dog person.  I mean, dogs can be endearing on some level, but who wants to live with one?  They are just always there, loving you, wanting attention, farting, tying you down.. ("Hey honey, can you run home and let the dog out??")

But there are dog people, and I have to admit that the relationship between Ruthie and Scoobert has always been kind of sweet, even when Scoob was a young terror wrecking furniture and driving his fellow dogs crazy.  They've been through a lot in the past eleven years, Ruthie and Scoobert, and they've done it together and stuck by each other.

And now, in dog years, Scoobert is no spring chicken -- shall I say it? -- he's a canine senior citizen!  He has improved with age for sure, though.   Haven't we all?.. Well,......

36 plus 50 doesn't equal 86

A Sunday morning fifty years today, I was sitting with my family in our wacko little church, listening to the preacher rant, when in the middle of the sermon he told us that Marilyn Monroe had been found dead that morning, at age 36, in L.A.  My mom and I looked at each other with shock on our faces:  Marilyn was a film icon, way too young and vibrant to be dead.  The pastor used the moment to remind us of worldliness doom, the wages of sin, etc., which to me sounded like "She got what she deserved" (He got what he deserved too, but that's another story).

Marilyn, in death, ended up being even more of an icon, a legend who would never grow old.

london's lookin' good

If you've ever been to London, doesn't watching this Olympics make you want to go back and experience it all over again? -- Just not til after the Games are over, maybe -- I doubt that the competitions look as good from the stands as they do close-up on HD.  Despite what Romney spouts, I think that the UK is doing a beautiful job of hosting.

why it's hard to watch the Olympics

--  Bob Costas is 60 years old, so how can he look so good?  If he has had plastic surgery, it is damn good!
--  When the Olympics are in a far-off time zone, you have to keep avoiding the news sites all day, or you will know the winners before you see the recorded action later that evening.  And even NBC spoils it by telling you in promos which new gold medal winner is going to be on the Today show tomorrow morning!
--  Hey, can we hear a national anthem other than our own?  We already know what ours sounds like, and how many times do you want to see Michael Phelps twitching nervously while it plays?  You can just imagine him thinking, "Should I put my hand over my heart or not?  Should I mouth the words or not?".. or is he thinking, "Man, I need a joint!"
--  The new NBC fall season looks pathetic!

And the # 1 reason it's hard to watch? --
--  The political ads!  :-(

clogging their arteries while repulsing us

As they choked down their fast-food chicken, the people who had lined up yesterday at Chick-Fil-A were making their statement of support for the homophobic CEO of the company, pretending that they were striking a note for "freedom of speech", when what they really wanted to say was "we want blatant gay-bashing to continue."  If the dude was speaking out in favor of, for instance, the Communist Party or the Muslim Brotherhood, which under the First Amendment he would have every right to do, none of those chicken people would have showed up; indeed, they would have been condemning him.  They might put another word on it, but how people love being given permission to hate, especially when blessed with that permission by a freak in a pulpit or a Mike Huckabee on Fox News!  Whoever these chicken-munchers are, I don't want to know them, and they obviously don't want to know me.

a generation of writers quietly leaving us

I see that one of my favorite writers/intellectuals/interesting people has died:  Gore Vidal, at age 86.  I in particular liked reading his memoirs, Palimpsest (1995) and Point to Point Navigation (2006).  He was one of those rare novelists whose real life was more riveting than his fiction. There aren't many of his peers left, and that's sad.  They don't make 'em like that any more.

LAS to MSP

What? LAS to MSP again?  Yeah, later this afternoon.  In the meantime, it's early morning, and I'm at a Starbucks at the Monte Carlo, enjoying the pleasure of morning coffee and oldies (Hendrix, Stones, Supremes) on the intercom.  The guilty self-indulgence thing again:  waking up at the Aria in the beautiful corner "junior suite" we were upgraded to, lying in bed looking out the windows down the Strip and beyond the Strip at the airport, the desert, the mountains in the distance.  Our room is theoretically on the 51st floor, but it can't really be the 51st floor since we notice in the elevators that the room floors skip from 39 to 50 with no 40s... Maybe they think we will feel more like VIPs if we think we're on the 51st floor.  Well, my coffee is about done.  On the intercom:  Fleetwood Mac, "Go Your Own Way"...

cleavage as a fashion statement

I admit there are some things I don't pay a lot of attention to, but, let me ask you this -- are young women's breasts, real or enhanced, um, way more apparent than they used to be -- or is it a Las Vegas thing, maybe carrying over from California? -- or is it like that everywhere now and I just wasn't noticing?  I mean, these slinky black dresses are so low-cut that I wonder how they, um, hold anything in at all?  And is it possible that being so obvious -- so out there, so  to speak-- might bring out nervous laughter rather than admiration?  On the other hand, I realize that I'm not the target audience!

(Sorry -- I think my blog content just hit an all-time low! In the future, I'll try for something more, um, uplifting...)... :-)

the view from an 18-dollar martini

It was maybe one of those moments that we work so hard for and yet feel guilty about --  the self-indulgence aspect, you know.

The photo is from the 23rd floor of the Mandarin Oriental Hotel... the Mandarin Bar, perhaps the most over-the-top extravagant cocktail lounge I've ever lounged in.  It's a place where Jerry and I go once each time we come to Las Vegas... It's dark, quiet, elegant, a bit decadent... with a view that keeps your attention.

I wish I could remember the name of the martini I had... I want another one.  Next visit.


maybe a bitter rose

Pete Rose now and then

Remember Pete Rose, the former baseball star, one of the best who ever played the game, the guy who can't get into the Baseball Hall of Fame because he had a gambling problem (that included betting on his own team)?  I know that it's hard for you to imagine that I'd run into him in Las Vegas, the gambling capital of the world, of all places?

But there he was, signing pictures for fans but apparently only if they were willing to pay for them... I wasn't about to pay to have my picture taken with him, and nobody was lined up, so I snuck this photo real quick, much to his obvious disgust.

Maybe he was having a bad day, or maybe he was feeling a bit degraded that this is what it's come to, but he sure wasn't very friendly.  If he had been cool or maybe if he had been wearing a baseball cap instead of that dumb hat, I might have felt differently.

MSP to LAS

"All my bags are packed, I'm ready to go...". Hmmm, who said that? Actually, I'm past that stage, am waiting to board after going through the degrading security process... Oh well, my blog readers know about such things. A person really has to want to get out of town to put up with it. I guess that's us.

writing without anger

With the encouragement of a couple of my friends, "E." and "DYA", I've been thinking more and more about getting serious about doing some writing.  I've set up a space at home to do it, and, to make it actually happen, I'm trying to think of the best ways to carve out time to write in some sort of structured way.

But, at present, I'm hung up on something:  I am most inspired to write when I'm angry.  For instance, if I were writing today about what's on my mind, I'd be attacking backstabbers, lying preachers, and willful ignorance.  Shouldn't I maybe be writing instead about making the world a better place instead of pointing out how f-'ed up it is?  Isn't there enough of that these days?  Or do I wander into fantasy, escape or "the good-ol'-days" past?

When I was young, maybe ages 15 to 21 or so, I was writing all the time -- obsessively, even.  I carried little notebooks with me at all times.  Something changed.  I lost the drive.  It might be coming back.

a sucker for free stuff

This will sound to my regular readers like I'm getting very repetitive, but this is how it is:  I'm going back to Las Vegas this weekend... But hear before out before you roll your eyes --

--  Jerry is going with me this time, and he hasn't been there in close to a year...
--  We had a free Delta companion ticket that expires on July 31st, and airfares to Vegas were the only ones that were remotely reasonable compared to any desirable within-the-48-states alternatives...
--  We don't need to rent a car there.
--  We have free hotel rooms (plus other perks) at the Aria Casino Hotel, which is one of the nicest hotels in Vegas.
--  It's hot there, but Aria has a great pool with misters.
--  Las Vegas, despite how irritating it can be, has become my default getaway place.  A lot of people in Minnesota have their lake cabins as their getaway places; I have Vegas.

We leave Minneapolis Friday night, back Tuesday night, by which time I will be wondering once again what I was thinking.

mid-summer sports update

Mike Trout

Referring back to my June 7th post "a millville boy becomes an angel":  Mike Trout, from my hometown of Millville, NJ, is having a dynamite rookie year with the Los Angeles Angels.  He's still leading the American League in batting average and multiple other statistics.  For me, following his progress has been the highlight of this year's baseball season.  The Phillies and the Twins are lousy, and who cares about the other teams?

Later this week, the Summer Olympics begin in London.  Wow, has four years gone by already?

And, much to my dismay, I see a Facebook friend posting today that football pre-season games start in eleven days.  Now, don't get me wrong, I like football as much as the next guy, but I'm just not ready to think about summer being on the downslide.  Once football season starts, suddenly it's Christmas. :-(

i thought i had something to say

Still mulling over the Colorado shooting massacre last Friday, I had planned to say something today about violence, automatic weapons, etc., especially when I see people posting stupid stuff online about how the answer to gun violence is MORE guns, and I realize I have nothing to say that could make any difference.

Thanks to spineless politicians and the National Rifle Association, the leadership and members of which don't care how much blood they have on their hands, there will never be any satisfactory gun control laws in this country.  It's a Wild West nation that should apologize right now to the future victims of gun violence and tell them that their lives are just not worth the effort to incorporate common sense into law.

what an online application doesn't show

Danny, our new "project", is looking around for employment, and the experience has been eye-opening for me.  How impersonal the process has become!  The majority of places where he visits tell him they don't take applications in person, he has to go online to do that (What if a person doesn't have a computer?  That doesn't appear to be an option anymore.).  I guess he needs to figure out how to get his personality and neat appearance, two of his major assets, to somehow come through on a stuffy, generic online application.

another dark night in colorado

A nutcase in Colorado who had access to as many weapons as he wanted to buy opens fire on a midnight movie-theater crowd that was there to see the new Batman movie.  12 people die, 59 are injured.

The country is shocked and stunned again, even though we keep seeing these tragedies being played out over and over.

And there will be more of these random shootings -- as long as we have such lax gun control and as long as the shooter gets massive publicity.  The creep's picture over the past 36 hours has been on every news program and newspaper and all over the internet.  He got what he wanted, and the next killer is paying attention.

july 20, 1969: the moon, it's still out there

The first moon landing.  Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin became the first men to walk on the moon, and Americans were riveted to their televisions to witness the moment (I wasn't.  I was living in Germany with no TV, and who knows if the Germans were covering the story anyway?).

The vision everybody had at the time is that it wouldn't be long until there would be passenger flights to the moon.  Well, that doesn't seem to be happening.  Do you know how many other people after Armstrong and Aldrin actually have walked on the moon?  Ten!  None since 1972!

'billy elliot' the movie

We were delving through the Comcast OnDemand list last night, looking for a free movie to watch, and happened upon Billy Elliot, the 2001 movie that the Elton John Broadway musical Billy Elliot was based on.  A cool movie! Makes me want to see the musical next time it hits the Twin Cities (next fall at the Ordway, I think).

One thing you'll notice if you watch the movie:  English is a very diverse language.  When these characters speak in their northern-England dialect, there will be times when you think you're watching a foreign language film without subtitles.  You'll get the drift of it, though.

the downside of being mitt romney's CPA

The political hubbub this week has focused on getting Mitt Romney to release more of his prior-year tax returns.  He refuses to do so, even though many of his fellow Republicans are urging him to just bite bullet and get it over with, and the more he refuses, the more people think there is something embarrassing or at least politically uncomfortable in those returns.

As a CPA, I say, just do it, dude.  Nobody understands tax returns anyway.  So what if you had your money stashed in the Cayman Islands?  Your political base probably thinks the Caymans are in the U.S. anyway!

When they were released back early this year, I did look over Mitt's 2010 and estimated-2011 returns (or should we call him by his first name -- Willard?.. which reminds me, do you remember that '70s movie Willard, about the guy who loved rats?).  They are fairly complex returns.  Most people who only have W-2 income and file a 1040-EZ probably would be overwhelmed by them.  Interesting notes from those returns:  his income is about $21 million each year; he has zero W-2 income; he has about $4 million annually just in interest income (Do you realize how much investment assets it takes to generate $4 million in interest these days?).

His CPAs:  Pricewaterhousecoopers, one of the Big Four CPA giants, for which I have no love.  These returns will undergo rigorous scrutiny -- I hope they had extensive internal review at PWC before Willard and Ann signed.  And I hope that no clients of mine ever run for President!

disjointed thoughts on a lazy hot afternoon

--  Wow, airfares sure are high this summer!  I have a free companion ticket that will expire July 31, but airfares for a first ticket seem to be what two normal ticket prices should be.
--  Besides, where in the lower 48 states does a person go in July?  It's hot everywhere.
--  I need to stop eating ice cream...
--  ... and Oreos...
--  ... and I need to get back to the gym.
--  If I weren't so depressed about the upcoming presidential election, I would be amused by some of Romney's potential vice presidential candidate choices.  Tim Pawlenty, seriously?  He only became a Minnesota governor because there were third-party candidates in the races, which meant he could win with 43% or 46% or the vote.
--  I wonder who will retire first -- David Letterman or Jay Leno?
--  What's for dinner?

danny has air conditioning and hair product

A follow-up to my July 3rd post, "the migration continues" -- The Danny Project seems to be moving along.... Danny has found an apartment and moved in over the weekend, although moving in took about ten minutes since he has almost nothing ("just clothes, shoes, and hair product").  Now he is on a mission to find furniture and household items (if anybody has anything they're dying to get rid of, let me know!), the first major purchase being a Craig's List used air-conditioner since today had temps back up around 100 degrees!

Then there was a resume to come up with... that was yesterday's group project, and it turned out okay.  Now he will hit the streets and job-hunt his butt off, I hope.  It's not easy these days getting a start at age 20.  In some ways, I feel bad for these kids; in other ways, I envy the hell out of them.

howard's gardening hints #2

A follow-up to my June 23rd post -- "howard's gardening hints" -- to show you -- especially Jon -- how the plants on the patio are doing.  "Take pictures!" Jon keeps telling me.

The best part of mid-summer is that this is when plants and flowers and trees are looking the best.  In August, they start to get scraggly, and then September is the beginning of the end.  Enjoy the moment.  Plant life in Minnesota is short.

le quatorze juillet comes around again

July 14, 2012.  It's Bastille Day in France and with French-tolerant people around the world who appreciate an excuse to party.  Here in the Twin Cities, the biggest Bastille Day celebration I've seen advertised is at Brit's Pub -- (British, obviously).  Here in our household, the only celebrating we've done (so far) was having for lunch some French fries (which are Belgian in origin).  Vive la France, anyway!  Maybe I'll get back there someday.

My sister Mary headed home to New Jersey this morning, and we miss her already.  She is perhaps the easiest-to-be-around person that I've ever known.

swimming with neil simon

The summer plays on the two main Guthrie Theater stages tend to be crowd-pleasers:  Currently on the Proscenium stage is the newly musicalized Roman Holiday (see my June 22nd post, "me, a member of the press?") and on the Thrust stage is the early-'70s Neil Simon comedy, The Sunshine Boys.

A couple nights ago, Mary and I saw Sunshine Boys, and it's a show that is enjoyable from beginning to end, thanks to actors that seem made for their roles -- in particular, Peter Michael Goetz as the crotchety king-of-one-liners, Willy Clark.  The show is there until September 2nd -- see it if you can.. You need a good laugh.

Then, last night, for a totally different experience, we had tickets to a mostly dance program up in the much smaller Dowling Theater, a performance called Swimming With My Mother, featuring a dancer with his 78-year-old mother, in sort of a synchronized swim/dance.  Hard to explain.  We liked parts of it, not sure that we really got it.  The sound system needs some improvement for this show -- the guy's lines were very muffled.  If we knew what he was saying, we probably would have gotten more out of the story.

jimmy has a busy but maybe unprofitable day

Late morning today, I stopped at the office in the northern burbs where my son Jon works, and he and all his co-workers were eating sandwiches from the fast-food chain Jimmy Johns.  Why?  Because Jimmy Johns had $1 sandwiches today between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., and who can resist a bargain like that?

Well, I resisted any temptation to stop at the Jimmy Johns near them, and I think it's a good thing I did.  When I got back downtown and was walking through the skyway, I passed a Jimmy Johns where there were literally about a hundred people waiting in line for their dollar sandwich.  The whole area was cordoned off for the customers, like they were waiting to meet the Pope or something.  I noticed some very well-to-do-looking people in the line -- some attorneys, for instance, who probably bill out at $400 an hour -- and they are looking to save a couple bucks for a half-hour wait in line?

I went to Arby's.  No line.

heimlich at the german restaurant

The Black Forest Inn, the German restaurant at the corner of 25th & Nicollet in south Minneapolis, is in my Top Ten of local restaurants.  It's just the kind of place you can't eat at too often -- the food fills you up and definitely requires some recovery time!

We were at the Black Forest last night for dinner -- the outdoor patio there is beautiful this time of year -- and had a great meal and were in recovery mode, regretting having ordered desserts, when a man at a table a couple tables from us stood up at his table, choking, panicking and in obvious distress.

A young man at the table next to him and calmly started administering the Heimlich Maneuver on him.  After a few squeezes and pounds, the man coughed up the lump of weiner schnitzel (or whatever it was!) and was okay, and all the restaurant customers cheered.

We don't know if the choker bought the Heimlich guy's dinner or not.  He possibly owed him his life.

july 1968: fort polk, louisiana

I was chatting with my co-worker Jeff this morning, and the subject of my military service came up (Most people who know me can't believe that I was ever in the Army).  That conversation has me mentally lingering on where I was in the mid- to late-summer of 1968:  Two months of Advanced Infantry Training (AIT) at Fort Polk, in the swamps of central Lousiana.  It was a summer of heat and humidity and foxholes and snakes and armadillos and M16 rifles meant to prepare me and my fellow trainees for the jungles of Vietnam.  It was the summer that I swore that I would never go camping the rest of my life or ever return to the state of Louisiana.  So far I have kept those pledges.

waiting for meatloaf

Poor Jerry. He had two teeth pulled today and isn't feeling so hot, and there he is in the kitchen baking a great-smelling meatloaf. Danny, meanwhile, is telling us that he had four shirts stolen out of his car today. Mary just finished reading her book. We're apparently going to watch the movie "Time Traveler's Wife" tonight. And I'm wondering why I can't think of anything to blog about.

hangin' out at the nuclear power plant

Mary and Joan and I, along with my sort of "adopted nephew" Danny, took a Sunday afternoon drive out today into the country (actually, only an hour out of downtown Minneapolis, but it seems like country to us).  It was a beautiful day that followed a week of heat and humidity, so it seemed only fitting to be doing something outdoors  and out of town.  Besides, Danny wanted to see the nuclear power plant at Prairie Island since he is job-hunting and his most recent job was at a nuclear plant in New Jersey and Joan wanted to have us drive through Red Wing, a cute city there along the Mississippi, about an hour southeast of the Twin Cities.  The power plant is next to the Treasure Island Casino, which, give us some credit, we resisted the urge to visit.  Along the way, we had a lot of laughs and learned from each other.  I don't want Mary to ever leave.

people who watch Wimbledon

My sisters Mary and Joan are tennis fans, and Mary's visit with us happens to coincide with the Wimbledon championship, so our TV has been tuned to ESPN daytimes this week for the matches live from London. This morning we watched Serena Williams win the women's title, and tomorrow morning we will be having breakfast while we watch the men's title match (Federer vs. Murray)... One good thing: there aren't many commercials, but what's funny is that most of the ads are for Rolex watches and Mercedes-Benz. What does that say about the tennis audience? Might we be the only ones who don't belong to a country club?

walking on the sidewalk, hotter than a match head

This is the old Lovin Spoonful song, "Summer in the City", sung by Joe Cocker.

Wonder why I thought of this song today.... Just because it's another 100-degree day?

it's better than heat stroke

I don't admit this to just anybody, but I can be honest with my blog readers:  I was a fan of the old Dallas TV show (J.R. Ewing, Sue Ellen, Jock, Miss Elly, etc.)  and watched it from 1978 until it ended in 1991.  I even made it past the season that turned out to be a dream.

The show is back after all these years.  OK, it's on cable TV now (TNT) instead of the main channels, and J.R. Ewing and Cliff Barnes are old codgers now (although Sue Ellen is still looking pretty good), and the primary stars are an all-grown-up John Ross and Christopher Ewing, and it's too much about characters that are either all-good or all-evil, but it sure looks good on HD (way better than the real city of Dallas looks in person).

It's not all my fault that I tuned in to see the updated version of the show.  It's been 100 degrees here in Minneapolis the past several days, and we needed some entertainment within the air-conditioned condo and, darn it, sometimes a person gets desperate, so we watched (On Demand) the first four episodes of this new Dallas.  What's scary is how much I remember of the original show.  I just forgot a few minor details -- for instance, that Christopher is really the daughter of Kristin (who shot J.R. way back when after they had an affair), Sue Ellen's long-deceased sister and that he was then adopted by Bobby Ewing and Pam (also dead), sister of Cliff Barnes, the arch-enemy of J.R.... well, never mind.  It becomes almost-incestuous when being described.

a movie you might like

Summer movies are usually crap, but we went to see a quirky, funny little film last night that was worth seeing -- Moonrise Kingdom.  It stars people like Frances McDormand, Bill Murray, Bruce Willis and Edward Norton and a bunch of no-name little kids... and it's sad that I still can't think of a better word than "quirky".. !  Let me know what you think.

By the way, to all you people and countries born on the 4th of July, Happy Birthday!!

the migration continues

My nephew James moved here a year ago at age 18, has done well and has apparently inspired Danny, his cousin and best friend, age 20, to move out here also.  Danny visited us here in Minneapolis back in January and liked it here, and, if you like Minneapolis in January, you'd like it anytime.  After anguishing since January about whether to make the move, he started out driving here from New Jersey last night (in an un-air-conditioned car with temps near 100) and is almost here.

Danny is a good kid and has a lot of potential, he just was finding very limited options where he was.  Let's hope he can make it work here.

The Danny Project begins...  This time, James will show the way.

the shocking news of the day



Anderson Cooper (wikipedia)

Anderson Cooper, star of CNN and son of Gloria Vanderbilt, today finally came out of the closet as a gay man.  Yay, Anderson!  Of course, the only people who could be surprised by this news would be those people who have never seen him on New Year's Eve with Kathy Griffin.

I suppose that the people who are boycotting Oreos (for making a rainbow-filled Oreo) will start boycotting CNN now.  Oh I forgot -- homophobes already watch Fox News.

Happy Canada Day, you guys up there...

July 1, 2012... Canada has been a country for 145 years today!  Seems like only yesterday!

this post deserves no title

I'm sitting here in the living room with Mary, Joan, Jerry, Jon and Tom, and the day is coming to a close and I haven 't been blogged yet today, so here goes...

I tried to get Jon to be my guest blogger for the day, but he says, "What would I ever blog about?", so you're not going to get a Jon blog post today.  If ever there is a person that should have his own blog, it's Jon... We can hope.

Kristin and Joan at Starbucks, 6.26.12.

Joan wants to know if I wrote a follow-up post to her Kristin Chenoweth sighting (my June 26th post, "Mary Arrives, Joan Buys") to let you know that Kristin mentioned her to the crowd during the concert later that night: "I got this iced tea at Starbucks in St. Paul, and I met the nicest lady there who bought my my oatmeal and tea.  Thank you, Joan!"...  And the next day Kristin even mentioned Joan on Twitter.

Mary is making strawberry shortcake.  Jerry grilled burgers for dinner.  Tom, as usual, is playing a game on his iPhone.

And now you have the picture.... More action tomorrow.

after jumping the couch

Cruise on Oprah's show

Other than his acting roles, Tom Cruise is mostly known for being a Scientologist and for jumping up and down on Oprah Winfrey's couch a few years ago to emphasize how much he loved Katie Holmes, whom he was just about to marry.  He is also known for being very anti-psychiatry and for being, well, a little weird.

In his case, a little counseling may have done him some good, or maybe Katie finally wised up, but they just announced today that they're getting divorced.  Oh, poor broken-hearted Tom.  After making a fool of himself on that couch, the marriage flopped, almost as badly as his latest movie (Rock of Ages) is flopping.  Although it won't be easy to make it happen, with any luck the next wife might even be shorter than he is.

news you can't trust

This morning, I attended a half-day seminar on "iPad: An Effective Business Tool."  Most of the 46 people in the class had our iPads with us.

It was well known ahead of time that the Supreme Court's ruling on the Obama health care law would be announced at 9 a.m., so soon after 9 several of us were iPadding news sites.  I logged on to CNN.com, where the headline announced that the law had been struck down.  I was disappointed by that breaking news.  If I had logged on to FoxNews.com (which of course I wouldn't do), I would have seen a similar headline.  Others in the class were getting a different stories on other sites -- that the law had actually been upheld! We on the CNN site thought that we had the right story... After all -- this is CNN!

Wrong.  CNN and Fox News both blew it.  I'm sure they corrected themselves a few minutes later, but there for a while we iPadders didn't know who to believe.  Who should we be relying on for accurate news in the future?  -- Perez Hilton??

the sound of the piano

One of the best things about having my sister Mary visit is that she plays my piano a lot while she's here.  She is playing as I write this, and it sounds good after being under-utilized most of the time, especially now that James has moved on to his own place.

I bought my piano -- a Steinway baby grand -- new in 1998.  I happened to be in a music store a couple nights ago and noticed that a new version of the particular model of Steinway that I own now costs twice as much as what I paid in 1998, so I guess mine was a pretty good investment -- IF I would just play it more often!  Note to myself:  My piano shouldn't just take up space.

Mary arrives, Joan buys

Jerry, Mary, & me last year

One of the best parts of last year was when my sister Mary stayed with us for three weeks last summer.... and now she's coming back!  As I write this, her plane is in the air, bringing her from New Jersey to hang out with us until Bastille Day!

Meanwhile across town in St. Paul, my sister Joan ran into Kristin Chenoweth late this afternoon at Starbucks (If you don't know who Kristin Chenoweth is, well, that's what Google is for).  "I'm going to your concert tonight, and I'm buying your coffee for you!" Joan told Kristin, and she did -- plus oatmeal and an egg salad sandwich!  Joan was thrilled and now is looking forward to the concert even more than she already was.  Have fun, Joan and Ruthie.  Stop over at our place after the concert, Mary will be here.

firefox vs. internet explorer

Statistics can say anything, or they can be totally meaningless.

I do sometimes take a look at the statistics for this blog, and I am noticing that in the past week, 39% of pageviews came from people using the Firefox browser vs. 29% from people using Internet Explorer (15% Safari, 10% Chrome, etc.).  On my PCs and my laptop, I've never used anything but Internet Explorer... Can anybody give me some idea why they think Firefox might be better?  (Faster? -- IE is already fast)

Other stats:  86 views from Russia this past week, 42 from Germany.  The Germany number I believe, but why is Russia in second place after the U.S.?  I still think some Russian hackers might be up to no good.

Windows was the #1 operating system of my viewers, Linux #2, Macintosh #3.  I've figured out that it's the Russians using Linux (whatever that is).

Statistics can be endlessly fascinating, or they can be dull as dirt.  Thanks for sticking with me.  спасибо to all you Russians.

they're sorry they're late

This has been Twin Cities Gay Pride Weekend, and today was the day of the Pride Parade.  It was fun as usual, about 150,000 people attending and/or marching, including our Governor (Dayton) and our two U.S. Senators (Klobuchar and Franken), and is a two-hour parade of various groups, organizations, music, churches, corporations and lots of miscellaneous.

Every year it's about the same, except that each year it gets bigger, and for me a highlight this time was a group of marchers under a banner of "Mormons for Equality", or something like that.  There are Mormons that are fighting the teaching of their very politically-conservative church!  I had read an article about that recently too, that some enlightened Mormons are risking excommunication by speaking out for equal rights.  I find this very encouraging, like some sort of turning point, that good people will in the long run select love over hate.  Several of the Mormon marchers were carrying signs saying "Sorry we're late!"  They may be late, but they are sooner than expected.

Howard's gardening hints

Jon, 6.22.2012

I live in a condo, and the advantage of being in a condo is that you generally don't have to do any outside maintenance -- snow shoveling or yard work, that kind of stuff.  Our condo is one of only two in a building of a couple hundred units that has an outdoor patio, which is one reason we bought this unit, but a downside is that we need to keep it presentable-looking, and this year it has been suffering from benign neglect.  Jon, my son the garden-freak, couldn't stand to see our patio with only one plant and a six or seven empty pots any longer, so my Father's Day gift from him was a trip to the garden center to buy some plants.

So, after an evening last night of buying and planting with Jon, I have these tips to all of you reluctant gardeners:

-- Be a procrastinator.  By this time of June, everything is 50% off, maybe more, and everything is picked over enough that your choices are somewhat limited, which makes your decisions much easier:  Less to choose from!
--  Since everything is 50% off, you can stress variety and buy some plants that you think might not make it, and if they croak you'll only be out of 50% of your money.
--  Get to know my son Jon.  He has become quite the amateur landscape designer.  If you don't have a Jon in your life and you are unmotivated, then you might be staring at empty pots all summer.
--  Your yard will look so much better if you do it.

me, a member of the press?

Guthrie photo, "Roman Holiday"

The Guthrie Theater generously provided me with tickets to two shows this week (for being a blogger, as you recall), the first being a new musical stage adaptation of the '50s Audrey Hepburn film, Roman Holiday, with all the music being Cole Porter songs.  It's a fun summer show, light and never dull, and who wouldn't like Cole Porter?, so if you get a chance and are somewhere local, give it a try.

Then last night I attended (with my sister Joan) a show up in the Dowling Studio stage of the Guthrie.  It's called Anytown, a dance production set to the music of mostly Bruce Springsteen.

When I went to the will-call window last night to pick up those tickets, they sent me to the "Media Area".  When those people at that table gave me the tickets, they told me to let the ushers in the Dowling know that I'm a "member of the press" and there would be special seating for us.

Hey, how about that?.. I'm a member of the press.  And I guess that means that all of my fellow bloggers are members of the press too, so if you have an active blog, you now have a new designation.  Congrats.

more midnight-sun stuff

Photo by Elke!

The midnight sun off the coast of northern Germany might not be quite as bright as it up there in Scandinavia ("Norwegians are nutcases that night!" Elke tells me), but it's near enough to the Arctic Circle to still be remarkable, and northern Germany doesn't have the mosquitoes!

in nine months, it will be spring again

Midnight sun in Alta, Norway

Right about now, here in the Central Zone of the United States, on 20 June, it is becoming Summer 2012.  Although not quite as great as Spring is, Summer is a great time of year, especially if you ignore the excessive heat and the bugs.

This is, for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere, Summer Solstice, the longest day of the year, sunlight-wise.  For those in the Arctic Circle, it's also "White Nights", the time of the Midnight Sun, when it never gets quite dark.

For several years now, I'm been thinking it would be fun to be in Scandinavia for White Nights, maybe Finland.  Recently, though, I found out that June is when mosquitoes hit Finland big time (did you know that Finland is notorious for its mosquitoes?), and I can't picture me sitting outside at daylight/midnight, drinking wine and swatting mosquitoes, so I have dropped that from my Bucket List.

Anyway, to all my readers, I hope you have a fun, beautiful Summer.  Believe me, it will go fast, find ways to enjoy it.

if it's tuesday, he must be in belgium

Remind me to never fly standby.  Jerry was a bit of wreck yesterday, not knowing if he'd get on one of the flights to Amsterdam or not.  Apparently he made it and is probably in Brugges, Belgium by now or on a train heading there.  A few days in Europe would feel good right now -- just without the standby thing.

Incidentally, if you scroll down the left side of my blog page to the photos, find the one that says "Jerry"... That is Jerry in Brugges, when he and I were there several years ago.. It's a beautiful old city.

what day is it, anyway?

I did a blog post a little while ago thinking it was June 20th and the first day of summer, so when I realized my idiot mistake, I had to delete it.... We still have another day of spring...

It was a lovely post too.. I'll try to recreate it in a couple days.

neither snow nor rock

Jon and Tom do make it a point of spending time with me on Father's Day, and I'm grateful that they are such attentive sons.

We felt like we should actually do something today and thought about going to a movie -- either Snow White and the Huntsman or Rock of Ages, but after we had lunch both movies had weird starting times and left us with too much time beforehand.  We stopped at Best Buy to kill some of that time, and I spent some money, and by then we realized we didn't want to really see the movies, at least not today, so we went over to their house and just hung out, which turned out to be better than either movie, I'm sure.  Got to see some of their Ireland photos too.  Thanks, guys.

IV detachment in the free world

If you're a hospital patient as you read this, then this post might not be for you.

I was just thinking, last year at this time I was in the hospital.  It was a week of surgery, blood draws, IVs, repetitive meals, bad daytime TV, naps every few minutes, and confinement....

So, for all of us not in the hospital right now, I say, I hope we all appreciate the freedom!

And, if you are in a hospital bed, first of all, congrats on bringing your laptop with you and for having decent hospital Wifi, but mostly, get well and get back to the world where you belong.  :-)

he's going to Belgium, we think

As you know, Jerry is back under this same roof and our status is a bit undefinable (if we even have a status), but I thought you'd like to know that he is going to Bruges, Belgium next week for a few days.  A friend of his gave him a Delta pass, which means flying cheap but being on standby, which might be a fairly uncertain position to be in flying to Europe in June, but I hope he gets a seat somehow.

He's going to Bruges because a friend of his, Laura (who visited us last year), an artist, is there studying for a month and he wants to visit her.  She seems to be enjoying her time in Bruges (it's a beautiful city) and has started a blog about her stay there, which you may find interesting (or not)... here's a link:  Laura's Bruges journal   (You know I like to encourage new bloggers)...

get them out of there

OK, that is way more than enough.

I was just reading that a soldier from the Minneapolis suburbs was killed in combat in Afghanistan yesterday, becoming the 2000th fatality in the horribly-named Operation Enduring Freedom mission.  He was just 21 years old, newly married in March... sounds like he was a great kid.

Why are kids still dying in that war?  Whether that war in Afghanistan should ever have ever been waged will be eternally debated, but, regardless, it should have been done a long time ago.  Bring them all home, and don't let another war like that one -- futile and endless -- ever start again.

crushed ice in his orange crush

"Now why did I put ice in this?" Jon asked as he was drinking his Orange Crush. "Why do people put ice in soda anyway?  The soda is already cold, and the ice just gets in the way and is annoying. And, when it starts to melt, it dilutes the soda."

We were at Broadway Pizza, the one in St. Anthony, for lunch today.

Of course he is just recently back from Europe, where they hardly ever put ice in their glasses of soda.

We do talk about other things besides things like ice in soda; otherwise, we would be a continuous Seinfeld episode.  I did get to hear a little about the trip to Ireland and about his next big trip:  two weeks in Austria in September.  And we talked about what to do this Sunday -- Father's Day.

It's cool to have two sons who are such world travelers, but it sure is nice to have them home too.  Whoops, I just got corny.

the phillies are in town



More baseball, can you believe it?

But here's the deal... The Philadelphia Phillies are in town to play the Twins the next three nights, and the Phillies, being a National League team, only come to Minnesota every few years (the Twins are in the American League), so we native South Jerseyans, most of whom are eternally loyal to the Phillies, need to take advantage of the opportunities.

I'm going to at least two of three games (wearing Phillies gear, of course), tonight with my sister Joan and my nephew-in-law Ryan and tomorrow night with James.

Of course, the games themselves won't matter.  Both the Twins and the Phillies are having a bad year, both in last place in their respective divisions.

replace what doesn't work

Why is it that I sometimes sit on the sidelines and watch my life passing by me, a spectator instead of a participant?

I go through these periods of seeming to not ever wake up and take charge of myself... I have just gone through one of those essentially self-destructive phases, maybe for two months running... letting life happen, being reactive instead of proactive...

Then I snap out of it.

Some undefined something happened just a day or two ago -- the phase of the moon? -- and I'm out of that stupid inertia and am kicking myself for having wasted two months.... Gotta make up for lost time.  It's decision time.

the theater isn't dead, you just aren't paying attention

If you are reading this as I post it, I bet you're not at this moment watching the Tony Awards -- the annual Broadway award show.  Unless you're Ruthie or Joan.  Or me.

Well, if you're not watching, you should be. It's always a good show, even if you're not a theater person.  And, if you're not a theater person, the show might at least tempt you to see an occasional play or musical.

Neal Patrick Harris is back as host of the show, and he's the best, so that's as it should be.

Meanwhile, out there in the real world, it was a hot, windy, muggy day here in Minnesota today, and days like that always whip up some scary, violent weather, and today is no exception. The Tonys keep getting interrupted with thunderstorm warnings creeping along the bottom of the screen.

If you're in your basement taking shelter from a tornado, then you're excused.

on his own... well, more or less

James is all moved into his apartment... At 19, this is his first place of his own.  It's small but cute, and he is putting his own James touch on it (A poster of New York City will hang on that blank wall behind him, and the lampshade is a picture of Tokyo).

..And his helicopter uncles?  We're just across Loring Park from him, a quick walk, but he has become remarkably independent considering that he has been out of high school just a year ago this month.  We consider the James Project to be a success, yet the chopper engines are still running...

we could be sailing

Elke and I have been close friends for ten years now, mostly by frequent emails but also in person a couple times.  She knows me better than almost anyone else does.  She and her husband Peter, who was once abducted by aliens (but that's another story), live on the north coast of Germany, and Jerry and I have visted them twice.  Peter's passion in life is sailing (he is a retired fisherman), and he has taken us out sailing on their boat, the first time of which didn't set well with me because we had just had eels and beer before heading out onto the rough North Sea.

Elke and Peter have been on a chilly extended voyage the past several weeks, north of Germany and Denmark (and not making it as far as Finland -- just like me!), and she has been sending me a few photos as she travels.  This one amused me, as it catches Elke enjoying some beer and feasting on a bird.  She has told me multiple times that she only likes to eat meat that she sees grow up, but I guess when you're out of the seas, you can handle eel for only so long and you make do.  Safe travels, Elke... 

a millville boy becomes an angel

It's not often that a guy from my hometown in South Jersey makes the big leagues,  but it has happened.  Mike Trout, born and raised in Millville, is with baseball's Los Angeles Angels (formerly the Anaheim Angels, formerly the California Angels, formerly the Los Angeles Angels) and is having a terrific season.  At this point, according to ESPN, Mike leads American League rookies in four major offensive categories including batting average and on-base percentage, and, if he continues at this pace, he has a good shot at being named Rookie of the Year.  Wishing him the best.  Hail hail to old Millville.

june 6, 1968: fort bragg, north carolina

One of the reasons that I let myself be drafted, and in retrospective it seems extremely naive, is that Bobby Kennedy was running for President, and I figured that he would be elected and end the Vietnam War quickly.  It was while I was in basic training that Senator Kennedy was assassinated.  Our platoon commander had this way of telling us that Bobby had died:  "Two down, one to go!" (meaning the Kennedy brothers).  Me, I was devastated, and I wonder to this day how history could have been different.  Of all of the assassinations of the '60s, this was the one I felt most deeply.

june 1914: Downer, New Jersey

There used to be a little hamlet named Downer in Gloucester County of Southern New Jersey -- apparently it's not there anymore -- and my dad was born there 98 years ago today, the eighth of ten children.  It occurred to me that I occasionally in my blog posts mention my mother, who was born 92 years ago yesterday, but maybe never my father.  Maybe because my dad was harder to know than my mom was.

It's hard to picture what my dad would have been like at age 98 -- or my mom at 92, for that matter.  Dad died at 75, Mom at 66.  Dad always lived in South Jersey, lived in the same house for the last 50 years of his life, worked in the same glass factory for 44 years (an accomplishment he was very proud of).  He served in the Army in the Pacific during World War II in a medic unit, which was why he loved the TV show M*A*S*H so much, but he never talked about the war.

He fathered six children, of which I was the first.  He was a kind, gentle man, but if he lost his temper, watch out ("the Dixon rage", we call it and which all of us have when we are pushed past a certain limit).  He was devoted to my mom, and he never was the same after she died so suddenly.  He died two years after she did.

Sometimes I feel bad that I didn't spend more one-on-one time with him -- a downside of being in a large family.  And I wish his grandchildren and great-grandchildren could have known him. He's on my mind today.

the silliest song of all

Yesterday, Tom and I were listening in the car to SiriusXM '80s channel.  They were counting down the Top 40 songs from this week in 1986, and there were some okay songs on the list, but the #1 song was Whitney Houston's "The Greatest Love Of All", which is a bit of a silly song ("Learning to love yourself is the greatest love of all [?!?!]").  What's funny is that after that, Tom and I couldn't get the song out of our heads.  Tom was texting me all evening that it was still stuck there, although he admitted that, considering some of the alternatives, maybe that wasn't the worst song in the world to be stuck with.

I thought about putting it here as my Monday video, but I just can't make myself do it.  First, it's a goofy song, and, more importantly, it has a 15-second commercial before it starts... But, if you'd like to hear it, here's the link: The Greatest Love of All.

Fair warning, though:  it's catchy, in its own way.

what can you say about a brother who loved the Beatles?

Today should have been my brother Ronnie's 62nd birthday.  He's been gone from us for a year now, and we miss him.

So to remember him, we have the strawberries, we have the Bisquick, it will be a strawberry-shortcake day, a Ronnie tradition.  And here is one of his favorite Beatles songs, "Let It Be" -- the pre-Phil Spector version (as Ronnie would have wanted it)... :-)

the James countdown

James can start moving into his new apartment on Tuesday, and he's excited, and I'm excited for him but at the same time feeling a little wistful about him leaving..  He'll just be on the other side of the park, not far away at all, but I guess "I've grown accustomed to his face", as Henry Higgins might say.  He  needs to at least come back often to play the piano, which he is getting quite good at, by the way.

Meanwhile, the condo stays on the market.  I wonder who moves next and when.

my horoscope for today

"If you're being offered a grim or simply uninspiring array of choices, refuse to choose.  Walk out.  There are better choices somewhere else."

Wow.  What if I were to take that to heart?