I talked about scars, strains and broken bones, but I didn't mention the major recurring injury of my life, concussions. At a casual count, I've had at least five of varying intensity, all from football ( Read more... )

To the extent that this journal has a theme, it's the fallibility of human memory, and my resistance to that fallibility by trying to document all sorts of things about my life. Sometimes that documentation is created shortly after the event, other times it's not until the end of the year, and quite often it's decades after the fact, but regardless ( Read more... )

Vox has a recurring feature that I enjoy called "the best money I ever spent" where they, in their words:

We recently started asking some of our favorite writers a simple question: What’s the best money you’ve ever spent? We wanted to know the things that brought them the most value, that marked a turning point, and that helped them make sense of ( Read more... )

They don't have quite the visual appeal of a good scar, but after that post it seems worthwhile to me to cover the broken bones and major strains of my life, all of which came courtesy of extreme physical activity ( Read more... )

Despite an active life of biking, hiking, sports and generally doing things, I've somehow managed to acquire only 3 scars in my life thus far ( Read more... )

Once I started sending birthday cards to all my friends, I naturally started getting more birthday cards in return. Not a lot more, but definitely a non-zero amount. I also started getting more Christmas cards. I also get one increasing elaborate Halloween card every year, but let's focus on Christmas for the moment ( Read more... )

Today is my birthday. When I was growing up birthdays were by far my favorite holiday. Today's list is assorted birthday hijinks ( Read more... )

Yesterday, I cut my hair.

Throughout my life, my hair needs have been relatively modest.

ChildhoodWhen I was a kid, my hair grew out and at various intervals I'd get it cut. I don't really recall how long I went between haircuts growing up. My mother would basically say "you need a haircut" and off we'd go. My mother, by the way, often expressed ( Read more... )

[1] I'm now up to 31 consecutive days without eating out, which obviously is my personal record as an adult and equally obviously is only happening because of the pandemic31 days may also be my lifetime personal record, although that's harder to say for sure. As a kid in North Dakota we didn't eat out for dinner very often. At most, we'd go out ( Read more... )

After summarizing both the shows I've seen on Broadway and some of the other professional musicals I've seen, it seems only fair to outline my own misspent youth in the theater.

I did four musicals, one each after the junior and senior year of high school, and two more in college.

Li'l Abner - Summer 1995 - I played Senator Fogbound, which is the ( Read more... )