On shaving my head

(This is a post about intentionally shaving my head. I know that a lot of people don’t have a choice about not having hair; if reading about someone choosing to temporarily remove their hair will bother you, then you may want to skip this post.) Many years ago, a friend and I discussed the possibility […]

Getting assorted medical things done

Sometimes September turns out to be the month when I coincidentally do a bunch of medical checkups and such. This year, that started in September but has continued into October. My recent medical progress includes: Getting the covalent bivalve booster shot. Getting the flu shot. Having a cancer test done. (Don’t worry, the test showed […]

Some good documentation

I complain so often about confusing or unclear documentation that I feel like I ought to occasionally praise particularly good documentation. Two items from last week in that regard: As I previously mentioned, the documentation at the Airbnb that I stayed at was great. Clear and brief, and placed in exactly the right places to […]

The well-documented Airbnb

(I posted this on Facebook on October 1, but neglected to copy it over to my blog until now.) I’m post-flight quarantining in an Airbnb in Forest Park. So far, I like it. [Edited to clarify: I’m not sick, I’m just isolating for a couple days after my flight.] One of the things I like […]

Alger Hiss and the possibly-forged typewriter

I recently encountered a reference to Alger Hiss and a “Woodstock typewriter”; I went looking for more information, and found some really interesting history, which among other things touches on the rise of Richard Nixon. My only association with the name “Alger Hiss” was that he was a spy; I didn’t even know when or […]

Parke Godwin’s _A Truce with Time_

I read Parke Godwin’s novel A Truce with Time: A Love Story with Occasional Ghosts in 1990, shortly before my college graduation. (The book had been published in 1988; it was written in 1986, and set in 1979.) What I remember of my reaction to it is that it felt to me more mature than […]

Family letters: August–November 1974

I’ve fallen a couple of weeks behind in posting links to family-history letters. So here’s a catchup post. Things I’ve posted in the past couple weeks include a set of daily what-I’m-grateful-for lists from Marcy, a recipe, some pages from my childhood journal (which I used mostly for practicing writing words), a couple of notes […]

Extra avocados

I keep catching glimpses of things online saying that there are too many avocados at the moment. To which my reaction is: Oh, no! I must eat extra avocados! For the good of the world! It is a great and woeful sacrifice, but willingly do I hurl myself onto the excess avocados and consume them, […]