Many years ago I found Return of the Frog Queen by plucking it out of a $1 CD bin at Diskovery in Allston. When Yolanda rang me up (I got some used books that day too) I told her that I hadn't heard of the guy, I was just intrigued by this slim cardboard sleeve with the black & white photograph of a guy about my age. I don't know what compelled me to pick this one up. Turns out Jeremy Enigk was the frontman in Seattle-based Sunny Day …
I love this door. Look at it. Just look at it! Not only for it's beauty, but because we've never had a door we could open like this, because we've never lived on the first floor like this. There's that old adage about things happening for a reason. Well, the veracity of that is questionable, but in this case, it's so true. Joe and I looked at an apartment 8 months ago, fell in love with it, applied...and didn't get it. &quo…
You
know that old internet chestnut "Pics or it didn't happen?" This is why
I've kept a blog for 26 years. That's why I know that I had my favorite
burger on April 24 2018--The Cousin Oliver. Veggie patty on a wheat
bun, bitches. Alas, they don't make it anymore, which I found out on
Facebook from Robbie Rist of all people. IYKYK.
Guess what, guys? On August 16th I finally started an online store for my T-shirt designs. It was three years to the day of Joe's heart transplant. Custom Ink has been printing my shirt designs for years, but only for my personal use. Custom Ink is great. My rep suggested that I test it out with one design and make it a Fundraiser instead of a store. So I did! This is my "Bear With Me" shirt. I made this one ten years ago at the lowe…
On August 13th I put up a #ThrowbackThursday post on Facebook. It threw all the way back to March 22, 1946. That's the day Grandpa DiPoala was Honorably Discharged from the army. James DiPoala had been, in the parlance of his time, "shell shocked." That's a term that originated during World War I to describe PTSD, and my grandfather came back from WW2 suffering from anxiety, depression, tremors and the inability to speak. He di…
They
hate the hijab and they have no idea why. That's why I am always saying
"there are no smart racists." The average racist couldn't tell you who
wears the hijab, what it stands for, or what's the difference between a
hijab, a wimple, a veil, a tichel, a dastar, or a fucking Amish bonnet. They just see the hijab on a woman and fly into a rage. As a matter of fact, the quietly intelligent woman who spent an hour twice a…
So
I have this uncle. He’s like 80 or thereabouts, I don’t know exactly. I haven't talked to him in years. For one thing, there was some questionable stuff surrounding his interest in underage
girls (including family members), and for another thing there was something shady about his overseas finances that was never
explained. He is definitely, without a doubt, 100% a liar, and not a very convincing one at that. My Lord, the stupid lies w…
Oh
brother. On August 3rd Stephen Miller's wife actually said of Dr. Fauci "Every man who has a journal is narcissistic." Keeping a journal is narcissistic now? And is that only for men? What an incredibly dumb thing to say. Tell me you don’t know any writers without telling me
you don’t know any writers. These people do my head in, Jesus.🙄
So, you guys know I have my blog cross-posted on various platforms. Well, I also considered posting on Substack. Then, as I do, I read the Substack Privacy Policy . After which I rejected Substack with a quickness. The Substack Privacy Policy is essentially "there is no Privacy here." It's even worse than the Google Privacy Policy update they published on May 26 of this year --the update that sent me running back to Diaryland to writ…
You guys, I'm having a vision problem at the moment. I have to step away from blogging because I can't see the fucking screen. Doc says it will resolve on its own and that there's nothing to worry about ...
Whether you're an old school blogger or you've caught wind of the rumor (it's true) that personal blogging is making a comeback, you should know about Diaryland ( diaryland.com ). Diaryland is one of the OG online diary platforms, launched in 1999 by Canadian developer Andrew Smales. For those of us who started out on Diaryland way back when "blog" was years away from becoming a household word, we writers poured our hearts &#…
Another
one of my mom's albums that was woven into the fabric of my childhood. A
lifetime favorite, not a clunker on it. Marlena is amazing. When I was
little I memorized "Yu Ma/Go Away Little Boy", which is a song that
starts with a long compelling narrative (Yu Ma) that blends into a song
(Go Away Little Boy). This is a send-up of a Nancy Wilson song, barely
resembling the original, peppered as it is with Marlena's sign…
It's a beautiful day in Boston, and a good day for this excerpt from my blog essay "Yes, I UnFriended You 'Over Politics." Have a blessed day, Friends. -------------------------------- NOT MY PEOPLE Here's who I simply don't care to know. Greedy people. Mean people. Nasty people. Manipulative people. Selfish people. Hurtful people. Small-minded people. Cheaters. Liars. Thieves. Bullies. Pretenders. Gaslighters. People who …
Look, everyone is free to do as they like. But when
I was a little kid, my aunt Sharon summed up a *certain woman on TV in one
simple word, and I never forgot it. “She’s over-processed.” I knew
exactly what she meant, somehow. That’s what I think of whenever I see
one of these MAGA women, especially when they’re putting
down beautiful women of color. Because "over-processed" is not judging or saying anything pejorative about
thei…
That's a lot of peanut butter wasted unnecessarily, in my opinion. Could have "honored" the dead artist, Wim T. Schippers, another way. Like an installation of big blown-up photos of the first TWO times he covered the floor in peanut butter (1967 and 1997) and a free jar of peanut butter to families visiting the museum. Did this really need to happen? More than 800 pounds of peanut butter — enough for around 15,000 sandwiches — has…
I woke up today and listened to Roll the Bones (Rush). Man that's Neal Peart (RIP) at his finest, both lyrically and technically. I love the drums on the whole album. Mostly acoustic drums, a departure for Neal, and his hits and fills are exquisite. The lyrics explore the role of "chance" in our lives. Speaking of chance. I don't specifically remember the first Rush I ever heard, but I know it was high school, in Hub's beat …
Isn’t this beautiful? There happen to be some nails already in the walls
of the new place, so I hung this piece on one of them. I love it. It
looks like a painting, but it’s a stylized photograph, printed onto
canvas. Joe bought it for me from our friend Bill years ago. Bill hung
out on this corner for awhile until he got the perfect shot. It was
chilly. I think everyone in Boston will recognize what part of town this
is...your thoughts?😋
“So
many of my friends post about how they feel about the present economy. I
wonder how they would feel if, in the future, they were one of the
fortunate ones who was earning a lot more money. Would you still be
angry with them for having more than you? Would you still think they
should pay more than they are now? Would you still think your money
should support those who don’t have, because they aren’t ambitious as
you?” (August 24th, 201…
