About ten years ago, people started to tell Dear Hubby that he looked like Tom Hanks. I must have been too close to notice a resemblance on my own. After being with DH a few of the times he received the comment, I started to pay closer attention. This month, the latest Hanks film came […]
The Sisyphus Sisters
For the last few months, I’ve lived 3 miles, instead of 2000 miles, from my sister. The other day I was at her house, just hanging out. She needed to clear leaves off her porch and driveway, so I asked if she wanted help. Loyal readers know that I come from a long line of […]
Salad Days
The Wall Street Journal ran a story about college friends who have stayed in touch since graduating in 1956. The article made me think about, and feel grateful for, the enduring friendships of my college-girl posse, including the scarecrow, the carrot, and the blueberry from this Halloween post. One of the posse recently used the […]
The Mother, The Anoles, and The Mealy Worms
With apologies to Nancy and Eric Gurney. This is a guest post from my dad. The title of the post is a reference to one of my favorite childhood books, The King, The Mice, and The Cheese (TK, TM, and TC), by Nancy and Eric Gurney. The post is adapted from an email he sent […]
The Crank Index
Son #1 sent me an article about cranks, people who hold strong, contrarian positions. The focus of the article was mathematical cranks, those who insist that they have solutions to mathematical problems known to have no solution. I especially enjoyed The Crank Index in the article, attributed to mathematician Chris Caldwell. Caldwell studies prime numbers, […]
Goals. Check!
Walking in my neighborhood, I saw this stray sheet of notepad paper. I love this list. This is now my list, and I can honestly report that I have accomplished everything on it.
Fall Sabbatical: Home Again, Again
For now, my parents still live in my childhood home, and I think about what it means to “go home again” when I visit there. This month, I am enjoying a different version of going home again. I am on sabbatical for the semester in Somerville, MA, living around the corner from where I lived […]
Arrivederci Professor Forni
There was an obituary in The Wall Street Journal for one Professor Pier Massimo Forni, “a poet and scholar of Italian literature.” I found this guy to be an interesting choice for coverage in a newspaper focused on business. Usually the obituaries in the WSJ are about people who influenced the economy. So how did […]
The No Worries Cafe is Closed
I once ate a meal at a restaurant called The No Worries Cafe. The meal was during a period in my life when I really needed a moment of no worries. Wishful thinking, I suppose, led me there. I discovered the closure when I was writing my blog post about living on the sunny side […]
Stay a Virgin As Long As You Can
When my boys were little, I attended a dinner party at the home of an older colleague. The older colleague is 30 years older than me, a full generation ahead. This man is someone I respect immensely, as much for his warm and accepting way with his family as for his professional accomplishments. Wine was […]