Columns
From the New York Times, Time magazine, and the complete Chicago Tribune syndicated columns
From the New York Times, Time magazine, and the complete Chicago Tribune syndicated columns
The doctor who saw me in the ER wrote in her report: “nice 67 y.o. male, flat affect, awake, alert and appropriate.” I had appeared with slurred speech and a balloon in my head, had driven myself to United Hospital in St. Paul, parked in No Parking, walked in and was triaged right in to […]
Read MoreI caught part of a radio call-in show the other day on which a vet was fielding questions about Addison’s disease among basset hounds and a cocker spaniel’s hypothyroid problem and what can be done about a bulldog who snores (he needs to lose weight), and it was interesting to discover the excellent medical care […]
Read MoreA pleasant late-August Sunday in London, bright and breezy, the bells of St. Paul’s ringing wildly for 11:30 Sung Eucharist, like a sacred pinball machine announcing you’ve won ten bonus games, the square busy with people including Americans like me, whose business is being tourists. As the poet W.H. Davies wrote: What is this life […]
Read MoreA night flight to London crammed into seat 29A but asleep thanks to modern pharmaceuticals and fairly fresh and bright on arrival at Heathrow. Wrestled the bags aboard the train and cruised into the city and lugged the luggage up stairs and into a lovely quiet hotel. It’s in the financial district, near St. Paul’s. […]
Read MoreYou know it’s going to be a difficult day when you wake up with “Guantanamera, Guajira Guantanamera, Guantanamera, Guajira Guantanamera” going around and around in your head and it won’t stop. You know that probably you should not tackle health care reform today though brainlessness has not stopped other people from weighing in on it. […]
Read MoreLast week, we got several perfect days in a row in St. Paul — fresh and sweet in the morning, afternoons balmy, and evenings you could sit outdoors until midnight and talk extravagantly about life as you did when you were 25. I have no idea what it was like in Minneapolis, but St. Paul […]
Read MoreIt’s good to hear that the FCC is back in business, thinking about the Internet and wireless telecommunications and not so much about assessing huge fines to broadcasters who say “poop” on the air. The new chairman, Julius Genachowski, is a 46-year-old venture capitalist who is more interested in technological advances and bringing high-speed access […]
Read MoreA summer Sunday in an old Midwestern river town, walking down the avenue under the elms past yards burgeoning, with vinous and hedgy things and multicolored flowerage, the industry of each homeowner shown in the beauty offered to the passerby. The children of these homeowners may be telling their therapists harrowing tales of emotional deprivation […]
Read MoreIt was a good Fourth of July where I was — no Republicans or Democrats, just a crowd of sunburned people sitting on the grass, and a brass band played amid the smell of hot dogs, and Clarence and Ralph, two World War II vets, described their European tour of 1944-45 from Normandy through the […]
Read MoreI walked the length of the westbound Lake Shore Limited as it left Albany last Sunday, six crowded coaches, and counted three Twitterers and a couple of phone texters, six laptoppers (two of whom were watching movies), four video gamers, and 27 people reading books. Books made of paper! Turning the pages with their fingers […]
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