Today’s date isn’t lost on me, and not simply because some of the people I’ve spoken to so far have sounded higher than a kite. (You know who you are.) For those unaware of April 20’s significance – other than our lovely friend Remi’s birthday – “420” in cannabis culture code and pronounced “four-twenty” is slang for marijuana consumption. In particular, smoking it at 4:20 p.m. This reefer respite began in 1971 when five California high school students called “The Waldos” met every day at precisely 4:20 p.m. under a campus statue of Louis Pasteur to smoke pot before searching for an abandoned cannabis crop. They had a map. Because,…
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Rainy-day replay
It’s not often that blogs are worth reposting, but I’m on vacation (yes, again), feeling lazy and most of my creative juices have dried up — unlike the sidewalks here in South Florida. If it’s Wednesday, it’s raining. As it was Tuesday. And likely tomorrow. Raining. Not that I’m complaining. This is April, after all. There’s a flood watch until 10 p.m. Rain is forecasted for the next hour, and the subsequent 24 hours after that. It’s 73 outside. Feels like 70 because the wind makes it feel cooler. (It’s 37 at home.) Anyway, you see how I’m struggling to find the right words here. Dry as an old dog…
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Shear madness
With so much disturbing news circling the proverbial drain lately – the ill-timed destruction of the electric vehicle industry as gas prices skyrocket due to an illegal war just when our household may need a new vehicle; federal ICE agents deployed to U.S. airports, likely including the one in which we’ll be waiting for several hours next month; and devastating reports that farmworkers’ legend Cesar Chavez sexually abused underage girls and young women (including civil rights icon Dolores Huerta, now 96, who carried the painful truth for 60 years about what her mentor and boss did to her) – it all makes my shaggy-haired head want to explode. Particularly that…
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Maybe think different
Apple Computer launched the revolutionary iPod in 2001 with this simple pitch: “1,000 songs in your pocket.” It cost $399. That’s around $725 in today’s dollars. The first portable MP3 media players were “retired” in 2022, but they’re making a resurgence among the younger generations who just want to experience nostalgia and a break from smartphones. As in, the joy of listening to music without being interrupted by notifications for emails, texts and dreaded phone calls. Call it a comeback driven by digital burnout. (Where are my corded headphones?) I’m also young enough to remember the original Apple iMac G3 from 1998. It was a groundbreaking, all-in-one computer that rescued…
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Testing our mettle
Strange things have been happening over the past week. Mostly good stuff, though, for a change. Take the U.S. Supreme Court ruling last Friday. How refreshing it was to see a megalomaniac in the White House slapped back by a conservative Supreme Court. And to finally hear the highest court in the land declare, “No, you can’t do that!” I’m referring to the justices’ 6-3 ruling that imposing sweeping global tariffs on nearly every U.S. trading partner exceed the president’s powers under federal law. At long last, according to New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd, “it was especially refreshing that the Supreme Court … suddenly found a spine.” How’s that…
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Crossing her Rubicon
Editor’s note #1: This blog contains curse words that some subscribers may find upsetting. My apologies. You may want to stop reading now. *** Lately, if you still watch actual news shows, you’ll hear pundits refer to something as “crossing the Rubicon.” The phrase is an idiom for making an irreversible decision. Passing the point of no return. No going back. It originates from Julius Caesar’s 49 B.C. crossing of the Rubicon River with his army, defying the Roman Senate and triggering a civil war. As Jules uttered on that fateful day, “The die is cast.” Five years later, in 44 B.C., after having appointed himself “dictator for life,” Caesar…
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Wastin’ time
This blog post was going to be about phone-free February, which I have failed at almost as miserably as Dry January. We’re nearly two weeks into the new month, and I’m afraid my digital detox and reconnection with real life will have to wait. (Sorry, Rebecca.) Instead, it’s a Wednesday morning in Southwest Florida, and I’m doing absolutely … nothing. To lift a common crossword clue, what’s a four-letter word for wasting time? “I-D-L-E.” That’s me on this Hump Day. But as British philosopher Bertrand Russell said, “The time you enjoy wasting is not wasted time.” This from the same genius who quipped, “Time is never wasted when you’re wasted all the…
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Iguana blanket
This morning in Punxsutawney, Pa., the groundhog known as Punxsutawney Phil emerged from his cozy burrow on Gobbler’s Knob and saw his shadow, predicting six more weeks of winter. Great. Just great. Thanks for nothing, Phil. It has been a frigid January for most of the nation. The coldest air in 16 years! Even tiny Florida scrub lizards are freezing in place down here. It takes a lot to stop these little buggers. When startled, they usually scurry away like they’ve had one too many espressos. Not anymore. Sadly, they’re stuck mid-stride on pavements. Hundreds of 10-pound frozen iguanas are falling out of palm trees. It’s an amphibious Armageddon across…
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Lessons in disaster
Seems as if each time I sit down to write lately, my mind goes to a dark place. I feel sad, disconnected, unmoored. Like a boat adrift at sea. There’s a chill in the air, and not just because it’s late January and the coldest air mass since 1948 has blanketed the state of Florida. You may have heard the phrase, “The Revolution will not be televised.” I suspect the author of that line from his famous poem of the same name, American jazz poet Gil Scott-Heron, had no idea when he wrote it in 1971 that 55 years later the revolution would be “live” and in color on tens…
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Blaming Good
Silly me. For my first blog post of 2026, I planned on lightening things up and writing about “Dry January,” where you abstain from drinking alcohol for the entire month to reset holiday habits and emerge feeling like a new person. Tanned, rested and ready to start the new year on a healthier note. Forget that idea. I blew it on Day 1 by having drinks with neighbors — for five hours. I could say I sipped on a double shot of Basil Hayden (neat, of course) for the duration, but I’d be fibbing. Nearly made it through the first weekend of the new year, though, but I blew it…
