I’m generally not that big on monster movies. Modern ones, at least. I always enjoyed the Universal films from the early 1930s — Dracula, Frankenstein, the Wolfman (Larry, not Jack) and the others. I liked the later ones that brought them into contact with Abbott and Costello. I was okay with the mutated insects of …
Sometimes strange things happen. Sometimes you set out to do something and then completely forget it. I set out yesterday to write about people who believe in conspiracy theories. I accomplished that in at least setting up the story, but the purpose was to finish with Donald Trump and how he is creating his own …
Things get weird at the end of centuries, and they get really weird at the end of millennia. Yes, I know we’re 20 years past that, but have you noticed that the weirdness not only didn’t go away this time, it just keeps getting more and more strange. My favorite story of what can happen …
My grandparents lived in their house in Ohio for nearly 70 years. My mother was able to visit until she was 63, my uncle Paul till he was 68. I was 40 the last time I was there, just after my grandmother’s funeral. They had lived in a small town of about 5,000 people. Both …
I used to think I was extremely knowledgeable about popular culture. Through most of the ’80s and into the ’90s, it was easy to keep up. Music, movies, television … if it was popular, I knew what it was. Not anymore. As we approach the end of the year, newspapers and the rest of the …
I have little or so use for the Republican Party’s latest blonde. Unlike Ann Coulter and Laura Ingraham, though, Georgia’s Kelly Loeffler was appointed to the state to fill a vacancy in December 2019 when Sen. Johnny Isakson resigned for health reasons. I’m not going to go into her issues or ever talk about why …
Let’s start with the fact that I have no use at all for 65-year-old Republican Congressman Ted Yoho(ho) of Florida. It actually hurts me to call him a crazy old coot and then realize he’s five — soon to be six — years younger than I am. But I can tell you at any age …
Most of my memories of Thanksgiving tend toward the generic. I remember last year in Guatemala and I remember 1974 in Columbus, Ohio. More generically pleasant memories are the dozen or so years when Nicole, Pauline, Virgile and I went to the Thanksgiving buffet at the wonderful Twin Palms restaurant in Pasadena, California. Last year …
“Hubris is the characteristic of excessive confidence or arrogance, which leads a person to believe that he or she may do no wrong. The overwhelming pride caused by hubris is often considered a flaw in character.” Americans aren’t the only people who think we’re the crown of creation, who somehow think we don’t have to live by the …
It’s beginning to look a lot like … like what? This Thursday will be Thanksgiving, but we’re being asked not to hold traditional big family celebrations because of the coronavirus. Otherwise the holiday song will change from “Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer” to “Grandpa Got Wiped out by a Virus.” Actually, the day …
