• On Pet Peeves and Quotes

    Over the weekend we had a conversation with the girls about pet peeves. We took turns sharing what some of our biggest ones were, which ended up being pretty funny. S. and I made most of ours about things the girls do that make us crazy. And the girls each chose ones that had to do with their sisters. The…

  • Love

    History is undefeated. Someone said that once, right? And history won again today when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that gay men and women can legally marry across the country. As much as scared old people and misguided middle aged and young people tried to dig in their heels, it was going to happen. A majority of the country supports…

  • The Chosen Few

    I am a wee bit distracted this week. We’ll get into it more soon, likely next week, but I made a semi-major purchase over the weekend. Which, of course, demands that I share a lot of words about the research that went into said purchase and how the purchase is working out. But that’s a few more days away. In…

  • Robin

    Robin Williams was a force of nature. That’s a cliché, often used in moments like this, but it was certainly appropriate for him. When he was on, and rolling, there was no getting in his way. Nothing was safe or sacred. Anything could, and likely would, serve as inspiration. He wasn’t the best comic of his generation, but he probably…

  • RIP Casey Kasem

    We knew this was coming, based on recent, terrible, news reports. But it still hurts. Casey Kasem, 1932-2014. It is not hyperbole to say no pop culture figure influenced my life more than Casey. I began listening to “American Top 40” way back in its earliest days. My parents listened to “AT40”. Their friends listened to “AT40”. My uncles listened…

  • On Waco And Different Beliefs

    Trying to get caught up on some links I need to share before we take a mini-vacation early next week. Malcolm Gladwell has a piece in the New Yorker about Clive Doyle, a survivor of the Waco, TX Branch Dividian compound, and the lessons that are still emerging, 20 years later, from that disaster. It’s a really interesting read. What…

  • Random Notes

    10:50 AM, Tuesday March 25, 2014, Central Indiana. It is snowing. I shouldn’t complain. This is only flurries and not expected to amount to much. 366 days ago, we got 9” of snow. Could be much worse. And it might even warm up to above normal temps in a few days. I think we’re owed a nice, long, pleasant spring.…

  • Lost Warriors

    I’m pretty sure at some point in the past ten years I’ve written about my mini-fascination with soldiers, mostly Japanese, who disappeared into the jungles of the Pacific during the closing days of World War II and lived for years thinking that the war was still being fought only to eventually learn that peace had been declared long ago. I…

  • The Return

    So, it’s been a while. Stuff has happened. Good and bad. Interesting and banal. Personal and global. So let’s get caught up. First, Boston. Ugh. I’ll just restate a terrific thing I read on Twitter Monday afternoon: never forget that there are far more people in this world like those who ran to the explosion sites to help than there…

  • Il Papa

    Those Catholics know how to do timing. I was sitting in the parking lot at St. P’s Wednesday, waiting for dismissal, when suddenly the skies opened up and what had been light flurries turned into thick, white flakes that cut visibility and quickly covered windshields. It only lasted a minute or so, but as those big flakes fell, I couldn’t…