Michael McDonald and one of his REAL loves, daughter Scarlett

Pop quiz.  What does this...

 …have to do with this:

Comment below before reading on.  I really want to hear my OS friends wax poetic about this one.

Now for the story behind… Read full post »

I got this from a friend named Barbara Hall who is facing the battle of her life this week.  A battle for her life, which could very well be the last battle she fights in Earth School.

She sent it to all of the people who love… Read full post »

I recently noticed while channel surfing that there had recently been a Nutcracker ballet competition hosted by Debbie Allen and Nigel Lythgoe (So You Think You Can Dance).

The latter convinced me to watch a couple of the versions via OnDemand.… Read full post »

Pres. Roosevelt watches a katsina dance at Walpi (Hopi) in 1913

I’ve been thinking about this since the final installment of my “Common Cold Chronicles” because I know that my “woo-woo” spiritual side may seem incongruous to a lot of folks who otherwise enjoy… Read full post »

The lyrics I clung to for solace...

My “unintentional vision quest” began with a young doctor who misdiagnosed one of the most dangerous allergic reactions a body can have as a “common cold.”   And I’ve talked about the the anger, terror, pain and the… Read full post »

For those of you who are new to this saga, the "syndrome" is a particularly violent allergic reaction to the gout… Read full post »

In the first installment of this sad saga, I explained how two ER doctors misdiagnosed my potentially fatal allergic reaction to allopurinol as everything from a cold to “contact dermatitis.”  

I am typing this at 2 a.m. because I no longer sleep more than one or two ho… Read full post »

 When I last "spoke" to you this was just getting serious.  What has happened to me since sent me to the ER three times to no avail, and when I explain how dangerous my situation became after that...well...let me just say that I'm happy to be alive… Read full post »

Happens in all those “hero’s journey” movies screenwriting gurus suggest their students emulate. 

The hero(ine) stumbles on or over some kind of “glyph” or other illogical or even irrational hint s/he cannot decipher.  But s/he does  … Read full post »

I have never done one of these “bits and bobs” posts before.  But as my life is definitely something of a “Picasso in progress” just now,  all I can do is offer some updates and little interesting things I’ve done and found and discovered. … Read full post »

 Typical Stock "Screener"

I’ve got the “bug.”   Bad.

You see…I opened a little bitty Scottrade account on a whim.   Just a few hundred, nothing big, to see how the other half live.   On a Lilliputian scale.

And now, I’… Read full post »

 The "Psychotic Bastard" and Wives

They tried to make it sound almost…like a privilege, this gout* thing.

The “rich man’s disease,” they called it when I hobbled into Urgent Care with my unaccountably swollen and aching left foot.  And then they p/… Read full post »

I watch this show every year.  I've watched it get better and better and better and now...it wins dozens of Emmys and dancers who previously would never have considered competing to be on or choregraphing for a TV show are standing in long lines and begging to have that chance.

Some… Read full post »

I think I must’ve been, like…15 or 16 when I first heard Terry Reid wail.  It was when he opened for Cream in 1968, I think. 

He was all of about 18 or so.   Just this little scrawny English kid—beautiful scrawny English kid, though.  Still, we… Read full post »

 Fourteen or Fight from Wild in the Streets

Sorry Albert.  I’ve seen this “movie” before.  

It was called Wild in the Streets, and yes, that’s Richard Pryor on drums in the first clip and screaming, “Amend, amend, amend” in the gallery… Read full post »

My London summer "home away from home" 

Bless Google Earth…there it is:   48 Lancaster Gate, London W2 3NA, UK.

It all changed there.  My whole life.  My outlook on life.  In fact, the rather prosaic life I’d been living gave way to the fast lane/… Read full post »

I don't have anything to say that can match what this song with few real words says all by itself.  Listen as "...a song becomes a thousand songs..."

If it makes you cry...that's a GOOD thing...

 The Roger I knew...with producer Russ Meyer

Okay, let’s go there, finally.

Why does Roger Ebert “tweet” my posts?

Easy but sincere answer?  Damned if I know. 

Not so easy and scarier answer?   I think he still remembers that tiny littl/… Read full post »

Gulliver:  My Oprah Replacement Therapist

I had tried to think of ways to get out of this thing all week. 

This "thing" was an Epona workshop designed to teach volunteers at Equine Voices Rescue & Sanctuary to handle their most traumatized rescues. 

And I… Read full post »

Yep, California elected that guy in the clip there—the one on the left.

And I dated him.  Once.

It was almost on a dare.  It was the Conan the Barbarian days.  I had interviewed him.  He asked.  

He had to. … Read full post »

So okay…we really are British on one side of the family. Distantly.   I’ve even been to the town in Buckinghamshire that bears our family name.

But that’s not why I stayed up all night Thursday night to watch The Wedding.   For me, it was all ab… Read full post »

 Mattie Russell my maternal great-grandmother

They never mentioned him.   

Never uttered his name, except to tell me his name.  Once.   And only after I had grown up and was apparently ready to hear at least that much.

If I uttered the name, silence fell… Read full post »