Breaking Up is Hard to Do

Posted inColumns, Food

All good relationships have to come to an end. I know this is for the best, but I thought we had another five to 10 years to go before things fell apart.

I remember how one word came into my head when we first met – hot. I was unsure at first, but eventually managed to learn how to live with the good and the bad.

Like a lot of heartbreak, the end came suddenly. I wanted to try and drag things out, but I knew it would only cause me pain in the end. I had to make a horrible decision.

A Stroke of Luck

Posted inColumns, TV

Thirty years ago this month, something momentous happened in my life. I had a stroke of luck which would help define me up until this day.
I got strep throat. More specifically, I got sent home from school with strep throat the same day that cable television was installed in our house.
Talk about good luck.

A Futile Quest

Posted inColumns, Family, Food

One of my biggest problems is that I don’t always learn from my mistakes. Generally this doesn’t affect anyone else, but I inconvenienced the rest of my family on Labor Day when we decided to go out for lunch.

Holiday weekend really provide ample opportunity to do whatever you please. We had already put together a nice weekend of fun, but had done a bunch of it separately.

I thought a nice lunch together would give the three of us a chance to wind down the weekend together. We didn’t see each other much on Sunday so we could spend the time catching up on what happened the day before.

I Just Want to Sleep

Posted inColumns, Sleeping

I woke up the other morning at my usual time for a weekday, sometime around 5:30. I don’t like that I have to get up that early, but my body has adjusted, and I don’t even need an alarm clock anymore.

Like I usually do, I headed right for the computer. I don’t even try to pretend to be anything other than obsessed with e-mail and social networking. It’s easier to admit you are a geek than to make up excuses to deny the fact.

So I logged into Facebook and started checking out what my friends had posted through the night. Thanks to the aforementioned geekdom and my big family and assorted other connections, I have a lot of friends on there.

At the top of my list was a post from one of the college students I knew from my last job. I like keeping in touch with them for many different reasons.

She also had just woken up. However, her status bemoaned being up “in the middle of the night.”

I had to laugh. I had totally forgotten that my usual wakeup time is an ungodly hour for so many people. I had forgotten that my college self would never believe that 5:30 a.m. would be a familiar time of day in the future.

Goodbye to a Righteous Dude

Posted inColumns, Movies

Like most of my friends growing up, I went to private school all the way through high school. I never got to appreciate the concept of wearing comfortable clothes to class until I got to college.

I thankfully had a very important window into life at public schools, however. For better or for worse, everything I ever learned about public education came from John Hughes movies.

Hughes died on Thursday, leaving a legacy of pop culture which extends far beyond teaching private school kids like me that sometimes you were graded in gym for very important dances and the true meaning of the Laffer Curve and voodoo economics.

Porch Rat

Posted inColumns

I have two distinct memories of the first time we saw the house we now live in. Maria and I had spent the day looking at some houses we didn’t really like before we headed to the final house on our tour.

I will never forget how I felt when I saw an entire wall of built-in bookshelves in the living room. Both of us love books, and that feature really stood out. We have taken advantage of that space over the years.

But the other thing I remember hit me as soon as we got out of the car. The house had a huge porch shaded by two big trees.

Jackpot.

My New Career Goals

Posted inBeach, Columns

Once again, I have stumbled up on a tremendous skill I possess with little chance to actually support my family pursuing it as a career.

We recently completed my family’s annual beach vacation. For the first time in a long while, we rented a beach house just for the three of us.

In past years, we had split a place with one of my older brothers. A number of issues ranging from the incompatibility of having 20-somethings and an 8-year-old staying at the same house to some problems with the house itself made us realize everyone would be better served with separate quarters.

So I spent a while over the winter perusing web sites to try and find a place small enough and affordable enough for us, but with the comforts that make beach week extra special.

I found a place and made the reservation based only on the photos I could find on the realtor’s web site. Sure, I wanted more assurance, but didn’t really have the opportunity to drive to Delaware to peek into these places.

If I had, I might have seen my new career several months ago. I stumbled upon it instead after we got settled our first night at the beach.

I should open a business where I give rich people advice on how to set up the vacation homes they rent to others.

After all, who knows what regular people want in a beach house better – some guy who uses it as an investment or a schlub like me who likes to pretend he’s living large for one week out of the year.

The Eyes Have It

Posted inColumns

I have always loved the ability to buy things on the Internet. With just a few clicks, you can have some new music on your computer or get yourself some new clothes or even pick out a new book to read.

Recently, I discovered another cool thing I could order online – contact lenses. But the simple process of allowing myself to see the world clearly has brought one big question to my mind.

What is with the militant oversight of vision prescriptions?

What a Coincidence

Posted inColumns

I could not believe my eyes. As I sat with my daughter to eat lunch at the Maryland Zoo 10 days ago, I thought I saw someone I knew.

Since I grew up and now work in Baltimore, this should not come as a surprise, but I still had trouble wrapping my mind around it.

That had nothing to do with who I saw. I did enjoy catching up with a former co-worker. It’s just that this thing seems to happen to me all the time.

I don’t want to sound like I have a million friends or anything like that, but I seem to run into people I know in the strangest of places.

Stop the Madness

Posted inColumns, Food

Sometimes, I don’t know what to make of what goes on in this crazy world of ours. Things just keep heading in the wrong direction.

This has nothing to do with the economy or pig flu or anything like that. I’m talking about chicken here.

Did you hear that KFC has come out with a new ad campaign? They have a new product and want everyone to know about it.

They don’t just want you to know about their new chicken, they want you to know that it’s good for you. Yep, they are advertising Kentucky Grilled Chicken.

I don’t know how to process that information, especially when they have an ad campaign built around the word “unthink.”