"Pretend you meant it to happen." That was my middle school art teacher's advice whenever my projects failed to live up to my expectations (which occured frequently because I had absolutely no talent -- just desire).  Learning and acceptance were the order of the day in Mrs. S… Read full post »

I've had many occasions to drive past a couple of intriguing blocks on the Northwest Side en route to visit friends or to go shopping.  The houses look unlike the typical Chicago bungalow -  but they are bungalows nonetheless.  

The nei… Read full post »

 Pilgrimage… Read full post »

 It's the first day since mid-June that the city hasn't felt like the center of Dantes Inferno and the temperature was in the comfortable low 80's. Cooler in our nosebleed section of the Friendly Confines of Wrigley field. We had a fabulous bird's eye view of the boats on… Read full post »

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Please Close Faucets Completely

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Mom & Big Sis at the Museum of Science and Industry

I pay my eighty-eight year old mother's bills every month and last night I almost had a coronary when I opened her Comcast bill. Ordinarily it's about $2.10 a month to cover the very basic cable service in her… Read full post »

Walgreen's musical selection while I was waiting on "hold" to speak to a pharmacist:  "I Wanna Be Sedated"  by the Ramones.

How did they know I was calling to see if my sleeping pills were ready for pick up?  Read full post »

 Ditched a field trip to the Art Institute to take these pictures with the new camera my father gave me for my 16th birthday. 

Celebrants enjoying libations on roof of news stand in front of Marshall Fields 

 Excellent View of the Parade from the stairs o… Read full post »

A brief  letter of advice and accompanying newspaper clipping sent from my grandfather to my eighteen-year-old father who had moved to Los Angeles to work in the family business.

As far as I know, dad never did play with firearms. Although he had to… Read full post »

Even more changes since I wrote this post two years ago.  My husband landed a job in November of 2009 after having been unemployed for 16 months.  And Kiddieland, which had been in operation since 1927, closed its doors in October to make way for a Costco which opened in/… Read full post »

This is so sweet and awesome, and made me feel so happy, I just had to share it.  Hope you like it, too!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CcsSPzr7ays

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 This afternoon I was cleaning out a closet and found an old box that my mother left at our house when she moved out of her apartment a few years ago. It’s turned out to be a time capsule of what she was up to during WWII.  (The only souvenir my father/… Read full post »

My grandmother Francie was a lot of fun, but didn't talk about serious things.  The exception to this was the topic of her first husband, my grandfather Arnold, who died in his sleep at the age of 47. When discussing him, she would pull a Kleenex from her purse, daub her… Read full post »

Last week, I happened to hear a segment on NPR where the host reviewed and rated the quality of various miniature video cams that seem to be available everywhere these days. The technology is ubiquitious, and you never know if you are being surreptitiously recorded or photographed.&nbs… Read full post »

^{If this looks familiar, you may have been one of the two people who saw it when it was briefly posted last fall} 

In November 1968 my parents, sister and I made our annual Thanksgiving trip to Manhattan to visit my senile-but-favorite grandmother, Bobby. She was withering away in a very smal… Read full post »

 

 Work has been busy while other life events conspire to make me too tired to write. But the good news: for the past few nights I've had a wonderful time catching up on reading fellow OSer's posts - both new discoveries and old favorites. The diversity of w… Read full post »

^{Postscript --- No surprises to report. The HR lady called me at work to inform me that I "was not among the candidates who were selected for the second round of interviews."} 

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Maybe it wasn’t all that bad.

Perhaps I am just “thin skinne… Read full post »

My husband is practically despondent because tomorrow is his 50th birthday. This isn't about vanity or the fear of getting old. Along with the well wishes of friends and the cards with the bad jokes comes a very real fear about our family's future. He… Read full post »