"The difference between the almost right word and the right word is really a large matter." —Mark Twain
What’s going on in my life
Donna, bless her, gave me a GoPro camera for Christmas. Naturally, I checked it out that very day, so I’d know how to work it on New Year’s Eve, the day my son and I planned to ride to Globe, Arizona. Here’s a short clip from the New Year’s Eve ride: it shows Greg and […]
A quiet day, at least for now. Shopping and wrapping? Done. Cards and letters? In the mail. House cleaned? Almost there. Decorations and lights up? Roger that. Christmas tunes on the CD changer? Fa la la la la, la la la la! An unexpected blogging window has opened, and I’m taking advantage of it. The critters, […]
I posted this vintage Christmas card to Facebook to amuse my friends. The kid’s woeful expression prompted a few comments. Really, though, if you study 19th and early 20th century portraits, photos, and illustrations, unsmiling faces were the rule rather than the exception. People always looked somber. I started to wonder why that was. Well, for one thing, […]
Yesterday Polly and I visited our friend Ed’s garage to do some cosmetic work on the Ducati. Ed, as regular readers know, is not only a friend but my motorcycle maintenance guru. With his help, we put on new clutch & brake levers, bar end mirrors, and front turn signals. The bike’s still a little rough, but there must […]
Post-Thanksgiving, post-anniversary, pre-Christmas. A welcome break, and a chance to catch one’s breath. Mostly thanks to Polly (but I hepped!), our outdoor lights are up. Naturally our neighborhood Griswold decided to one-up everyone by opening a Toyota dealership at his house. Goddamn thing is visible from the highway! About 8:30 PM on the eve of our […]
I was told again and again, but kept forgetting. Before Donna even got out of bed Sunday morning I was in the kitchen starting a big pot of chili. By the time she emerged, it was too late to stop: the beans and meat were in the pot, bubbling away. She shook her head and explained once more that […]
Black Friday is a tawdry commercial invention and I won’t give it the dignity of calling it tradition, no matter how many years it’s been going on. A tradition I endorse, on the other hand, is the Black Friday horror story. Another tradition I endorse is avoiding human contact by shopping online. But in a fit of […]