New Shoes in the Rain

Good Monday morning to you!  It's late enough in the morning that I can afford to be chipper, having had coffee and a reasonable amount of time to return to work-mode. Did you watch the Oscars last night?  We debated on it here at my house and ultimately decided that we had nothing else planned, so we invested three-plus hours in what I could easily characterize as the most unusual awards show I've seen in a while. Important to note that we attempted the same with the Golden Globes several weeks ago, and gave up after about fifteen minutes, it was that bizarre. This was better in several respects, namely the setting.  The event was staged at Los Angeles' historic Union Station, which is a classic art-deco building that still exudes the same appeal it did when newly constructed.  And there were no hosts, which means fewer lame jokes, no production numbers, etc. But the cadence of the show was off.  Presenters would walk into view (in a variety of locations in the...

Here in central Kentucky we awoke to a bit of snow from the night before.  Always a bit of a shock to be wearing shorts one day, and have snow on the ground the next.   Yesterday’s news of the guilty verdict in the trial of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was in some ways unsurprising, yet in other ways downright shocking.  So seldom does a verdict come out the way that the known facts would indicate it should, given what a racially charged situation this was and still is.  Experts had said repeatedly that the length of jury deliberations would be a direct indication of whether Chauvin would be found guilty or acquitted. Amid the rejoicing by so many people of so many backgrounds, it was hard not to consider the fact that the legal system allows for appeals of convictions, so this is far from over, in my view.  As it stands now, Chauvin will be incarcerated for eight weeks until his sentencing hearing, and it’s likely a given ...

Welcome to the weekend, my friends!  We hardworking folks look forward to two days of respite and doing what we want, instead of what we must! This week I had and experience I had not had since sometime in 2018.  I attended a Major League Baseball game, hosted by and featuring my lifelong team, the Cincinnati Reds. I don't imagine I need to detail the reasons why it's been so long since I last went to a Reds game.  If memory serves, I accompanied my son and his "big" kids (now 11 and 9) to a game back in the 2018 season.  During a big part of 2019, I was again in the midst of a job search and did not want to spend the money necessary to go to a game, so didn't.  And in 2020, of course, fans were not permitted to attend regular season games due to the coronavirus pandemic. So I was simultaneously excited and apprehensive about the Reds' announcement that Ohio state regulations allowed them to welcome a certain percentage of fan capacity to games this year.  ...

It's Thursday, friends, so hope you're looking forward to the weekend. I was very upset with the news from Colorado that there was yet another mass shooting event in that state, a state where my daughter, son-in-law and two grandchildren live.  This event occurred at a King Soopers grocery store, part of the same chain where my daughter and her family shop and not terribly far away from the Boulder store where this happened. The following day we learned that the suspected assailant is a 21-year-old man with a history of violent outbursts and assaulting others, a man who had been bullied by fellow students earlier in his life.  To my knowledge there's been no specific statement made about the motive for the attack, which left ten people dead.  In his initial court appearance yesterday, his attorney requested a mental health assessment of her client. Just a few days before, a man entered and opened fire on employees and others in a series of Asian-owned spas in the Atlanta ...

IT'S FRIDAY! Need I say more?  Maybe not, but I will anyway. I'm working in my home office today, having spent yesterday out in the field, and am listening to a Dire Straits album that was first released in 1980.  Yes, that's approximately 41 years ago, and I make no apology for that.  The band's leader, Mark Knopfler, was and is a guitar prodigy (search him on YouTube and prepare to be astounded at his talent and range).   I prefer to think of music like this not as old but as enduring.  I've listened to some of Knopfler's solo recordings since the breakup of Dire Straits (by the way, that's a really cool name for a band) and I like some of the music, but not as much as his old band. By way of explanation, if you're a regular visitor here, you may have looked at the sidebar comments about me and you'll see that I don't generally listen to music made by performers younger than I am. That's getting harder, since I'll be 61 in July. But tha...

The week's nearly over, friends, so hope you have a good weekend planned and get the weather to do some things you'd like to do! It was a year ago today that we received so much news about how COVID-19 was already influencing our normal way of life.  On this day The WHO declared it to be a pandemic.  Then-President Trump announced a national ban on travel from Europe.  The NBA cancelled some games.  We learned that Tom Hanks and his wife had both been diagnosed with the virus.  And we were told by public health experts that things were going to get a great deal worse. And they did.   Today, though, I'm struck by how many positive things seem to be happening right now, and, of course, some of this is a matter of perspective.  First up, President Biden will sign the American Rescue Plan tomorrow, which passed both houses of Congress despite not receiving a single Republican vote.  Audacious in its dollar value of nearly $2 trillion, the bill provide...

Greetings one and all.  Hope the weather hasn't caused you any problems....certainly feel badly for those affected by the heavy rains and subsequent flooding throughout parts of the Ohio Valley, including parts of my home state of Kentucky. I like to think of myself as a neat and reasonably well-groomed fella.  I once had hair that covered my ears, a period that ended when I began working an after-school job where unloading trucks was a regular task and got tired of having sweaty hair.  I had a semi-beard briefly in college, but only once after that did I attempt facial hair, and shaved that off soon thereafter.  And I've worn my hair in what I would generously call a crew cut for about twenty years. With all of that in mind, I've always had a few distinct habits when it comes to my personal grooming.  I must confess that I've never been an everyday blade shaver.  My dad gave me an electric shavers when I turned 16 (would have liked to have received a car, ...