Why do you go out to a restaurant? To eat? I don’t think so. Not me, anyway. I go to a restaurant not to eat, but to enjoy eating. This means eating with someone . . . and generally having a conversation. You can’t have a decent conversation if you can’t hear. It’s tough to […]
Feeding Deer in the Winter and Beyond
My wife usually has a bag of apples on the kitchen counter. For me I like the larger apples, but for deer I like the smaller apples, although I sometimes worry they will choke on them. I don’t give deer CPR. I don’t know what kind they really enjoy, but if they have visited our […]
Minor Disaster Preparation
I had a Friday morning meeting with the Communications Committee of the Transportation Club of Tacoma. Afterwards I drove to Westgate to make a deposit. I was shocked when I saw fifteen cars parked at Key Bank. It looked like people were going crazy preparing for a complete disaster. There was a snow storm coming, […]
A Football Farce vs. A Theatrical Farce
I could have been like many Americans and stayed home or gone to a bar to watch the Super Bowl and the half-time program. Instead Peg and I drove to CenterStage in Federal Way and joined fifty other people to see The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940. Believe me, I am not disparaging the size […]
Your Mommy, To Mama, Umami
Umami or savory is one of the five basic tastes. It is characteristic of broths and cooked meats . . . and somewhere in-between. It sometimes produces an exclamation like, “Whoa? What the heck is that?” I found the answer! The day before I had made Peggy a sausage-mushroom omelet breakfast with one little strange […]
The Problem with Some Contractors
Most contractors are reliable. Some aren’t. I’ve run into both. Here’s a list of top contractor issues from a Rental Property Investor from Milwaukee, WI: Quality of work Timeliness (showing up late to appointments) Smoking and leaving cigarette butts on the property Not cleaning up the job site in general Communication biggerpockets.com/forums/311/topics/175251-what-are-your-top-5-complaints-hang-ups-with-contractors Most of my […]
Riverside Jazz Festival
All Peg and I knew was that our grandson Riley was participating in the Riverside Jazz Festival on January 19th at Auburn Riverside High School. We walked through the halls of the high school to the auditorium, past the library and cafeteria where various school jazz bands were warming up. Meghan Wagner and her people […]
Not One Less – Persistence and Perception
“Not One Less is a 1999 drama film by Chinese director Zhang Yimou, adapted from Shi Xiangsheng’s 1997 story ‘A Sun in the Sky.’ . . . The film addresses education reform in China, the economic gap between urban and rural populations, and the prevalence of bureaucracy and authority figures in everyday life.” – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_One_Less […]
The Float! – The Flotation Device Restaurant Review
We met our friends this side of the Narrows Bridge and traveled together to Purdy for breakfast at The Floatation Device Pub & Grill. http://thefloatationdevice.com/ “The Float” as it’s called is a sports bar, but more importantly it’s a football bar. There are life-sized statues out front of a troll and a bear. The troll […]