Odds and Ends
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My favorite game represents a bitter irony. I’m passionate about the game in question, which equates to loving it, but I would prefer my car get stolen to losing at this particular game. A participant, if they fail to strategize correctly, can reach a point during the game when they realize cosmic justice is a…
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Cop-out statements: That’s what bugs me. The one sitting atop the list is one we’ve all heard to the point ad nauseum, the ever-uttered drone: I wouldn’t want to bring a kid into this world. Naturally, the person uttering this done-to-death screech of pessimism is lousy at pair-bonding and too critical for relationships. More to…
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Death – Taxes – Gravity – Eagle fans hating the Cowboys and vise-versa – Philly fans hating Mets fans and vise-versa – Red Sox fans hating the Yankees and vise-versa – The New York Times will cause me to grind my teeth – My wife prefacing an item on her wish list by uttering the…
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The following is assuming I can time-travel: So that no young boy would ever have to utter the despairing words, “Say it ain’t so, Joe,” I would warn my dinner guest, “Don’t do it, Joe!” Can you guess my guest?
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This past year, I have developed what I call, my old man sleep pattern. Doubtless, I have accumulated my share of birthdays, but not enough for the “dreaded” old man pattern. Nevertheless, wherever I happen to be come 10:00p.m., be it in front of the television watching a ballgame, curled up on the sofa reading…
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No one would describe Pink Floyd as a band whose strength was vocal art, but their rhythmic pulses and harmonic shifts are among the deftest in classic rock literature—both are evident in the song Astronomy Domine. Led Zeppelin used a large canvas to composed numerous pocket symphonies that bridged rock and blues. With superior musicianship…
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Human beings are genetically hardwired to compete. But what would happen when all that hardwiring collides with the Malthusian concern that suggests we live on a finite planet with finite resources that must accommodate an ever-expanding population? The following is a piece I wrote back in ’23 and put on a static page in late…
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This is one of my favorite scenes from Dog Day Afternoon, a film directed my Sidney Lumet, starring Al Pacino and John Cazale. Previously, Pacino and Cazale appeared together in The Godfather part I and II. Leaping past the absurd, my wish list is to visit The Cotswold’s in England and go hiking in Ireland.
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In the film Once Upon a Time in America, Noodles, played by Robert De Niro, said to Chief Aiello, played by Danny Aiello, “You know, Aiello, for a rotten lousy no-good sonofabitch, you’re not half bad.” That bit of movie dialogue might not represent my most ideal tagline, but I thought I’d start off the…
