When our 10-year-old dog died unexpectedly last June, Tamie and I decided we weren’t going to get another one. Raising a puppy is exhausting and saying the final goodbye is too painful. Besides, now that we had grandkids, we needed the flexibility to travel literally anywhere in the world to see them at a moment’s… Continue reading Getting Found
Thirty-five minutes. That’s how long it took me to bury my dad’s remains after his funeral earlier this month. I don’t know if that’s fast or slow because I haven’t buried a lot of bodies. At least ones that are substantially larger than, say, a hamster. It’s not that I was in a hurry. In… Continue reading December Dirt
My insurance provider is sending me a free in-home test kit to screen for colorectal cancer. I’m not sure where they got the idea that I’m good at do-it-yourself projects. It took me two tries, four unnecessary holes, and a lot of bad words to install a “No Tools Required” safety gate at the top… Continue reading Wish Me Luck
How’s my dad doing? Admirably, badly, decently. Poorly. Sometimes satisfactorily. And sometimes not. The answer depends on exactly when you ask and where I am, alphabetically, on my list of valid responses. I’ve been cycling through this same set of words for the past six months. He was doing admirably after shattering his hip, then… Continue reading My Words
July 10, 2021 My dog would’ve made a terrible pirate. Ivan’s swordsmanship was mediocre, at best, and he certainly couldn’t be trusted to carry around a live parrot. He was notoriously bad, though, at burying treasure. Whenever he’d acquire something particularly valuable, like a marrow bone, he’d rush off to bury it beneath the pear… Continue reading Swashbuckled
June 10, 2021 My dog died today. I took him to the vet yesterday for what I thought was an ongoing sensitive-stomach issue, but turned out to be a ruptured mass in his small intestine. The cancer had already spread to his nearby lymph nodes and liver, and he was septic. They gave him 12-hours.… Continue reading Ivan The Terrible
Like most people, I needed to use the word “circumcise” in a text message earlier this week except I didn’t know how to spell it so I asked the internet and now I’m getting ads for circumcision clamps on all my web pages. Now I'm thinking about starting a side business. I’ve spent my entire… Continue reading Working for Tips
I’m going to start showing up on some sort of Untrained Employee List at work in a few weeks. My company rolled out a new series of required training courses this year to teach people like me how to “build inclusive team behaviors” and “manage team bias” and “empower a team speak-up culture” which essentially… Continue reading Back to the Breakfast Club
Lots of people keep asking how things are going here in Idaho. So. As you may recall, my 78-year-old father fell and shattered his hip five weeks ago. A few days after getting it repaired, he had an undiagnosed ulcer burst which led to another emergency surgery. In the month since then, his heart and… Continue reading Wednesdays are the Worst Days
I’m balding, separated from my wife, and living in the back bedroom of my parents’ house. Sure, two of those things are only temporary setbacks, but this isn’t how I’d imagined life at 51. Still, I know I’m right where I need to be right now. My dad slipped and broke his hip last week,… Continue reading Slipping
Eating My Way to the Top 