That’s right, even with their weird bloated-shut eyes and fuzzy lint-ball bodies, baby cardinals are still cute. We noticed the nest last Friday during a particularly ribald round of Yahtzee! on the porch (sorry, no details). It’s tucked behind a grape-vine trellis just outside one of the screened windows.
The mama came out and squeaked for [...]

Today’s the big day. The presidential election. It warms my heart to think of the millions of other people writing about it at this very moment. People from all across the country; all across the globe. Maybe in the distant future we will be neighbors on the pages of a history book.
My real-life neighbors [...]

From the end of my street I can see all the skyscrapers of Minneapolis. If that isn’t evidence of what a big small city Minneapolis is, nothing ever will be. There are about four or five real skyscrapers in that city across the river. The whole mass of big, shiny glass buildings occupies only a [...]

Oh how I wish Garrison Keillor were my puppy. I would feed him and take him for walks and build him a doghouse of scrap wood and bent nails. In return, he would love me and smile at me in that expressionless way of his. On Saturdays he would tell me jokes and sing old [...]

I had a busy day at work today. For me, that looks a lot different than you might expect. For a firefighter, a busy day involves riding in the truck, running into burning buildings, sliding down the pole (do they still do that?), etc. For my mom, who designs closets, a busy day means driving [...]

The radio said today would be the last nice day of fall. Already this Monday they used the word snow. At first tentatively, like a kitten nudging a ball of yarn. Like an afterthought.
“Temperatures dropping into the 30s Friday night with a 40% chance of rain,” the weatherman says, then adding a whispered “… or [...]

I have always hated baseball. The standing around. The body-part scratching. The throwing and catching. Goofy socks.
There are so many ways to ridicule the game of baseball that it’s difficult to choose where to start. Difficult, but not impossible.
As a kid whose parents were from South America, I grew up with the notion that soccer [...]

Note: This isn’t as cheerful a thing as I’d like to post, but at five in the morning it’s all I can muster.
The Minnesota Department of Transportation announced last week that roadside memorials, while an understandable expression of grief, were an unsafe distraction to drivers. They contacted the families of those who’ve died on our [...]

Whenever people ask me what Yom Kippur is about, I always tell them it’s the Jewish holiday for feeling bad about yourself. Every religion has one of these, seemingly; often they involve not eating or giving up some small luxury (see Lent, diet coke, in the case of my old boss). If you watch public [...]

Got a call late last night that the soup kitchen was open. So I went over to the neighbors’ house to see what was available. Their grandson (who’s my age) works in a Scandinavian bakery/deli near here called, naturally, The Scandinavian Bakery. He’s always bringing home leftovers.
Usually it’s bread in one of its various [...]