If there’s one way to guarantee low blog post readership, it’s to make it about golf. I can already hear my dad and my mother-in-law sighing as they read that first line. I have disappointed both of them. Again. You’d think they would be used to it by now. And yet, they still love me. […]
April 5, 2025
Examining my fears as our child enters this unique job market You never stop being a parent. My dad still worries about me, tells me to be careful on long trips, and generally tells me to do my best not to be an idiot. I’ve made it 63 years in spite of, or perhaps because […]
March 15, 2025
I turned 63 years old this week. I’m quite good with it. As they say, it’s way better than the alternative! I decided to share some random birthday thoughts in this post, so here we go. When the ground shifts, I’ve found the best thing to do is to be of service. Go where the […]
March 1, 2025
Tom Peters, a famous writer on business and management, wrote, “If you’re not confused, you’re not paying attention.” Well, based on my level of confusion, I can confidently report that the good news is that I am paying attention. I have never been more dazed and confused. I think that is what this administration wants. […]
September 15, 2022
We had a wedding last weekend. It was perfect. Well, it was as perfect as life these days would allow it to be. Let’s start off with the challenges. First of all, and damn you COVID-19 for still existing, finding a venue for this wedding was stupid crazy hard. Ryan and Yesi scoured Sacramento for […]
April 25, 2020
It may have been the most thoughtless senior prank I ever experienced. As a former high school principal, I don’t love senior pranks. Usually, very little thought goes into them, and they end up being destructive, damaging, or time consuming. Occasionally though — and I mean very occasionally — a group of seniors pulls off […]
April 16, 2022
If you started singing the theme song from Green Acres when you saw that title, you may (1) way too impacted by afternoon tv in the 1970s, and (2) also be considering this question. August 31 was my last official day at work in my job as a school superintendent. For almost eight months, I […]
Fritz Gilbert
2020
Read: 2024
Non-Fiction, Reading Now
After I finished my first year of retirement, I found this book. Mr. Gilbert’s book is thoughtful and introspective in his analysis and reflections. His advice would be to read this book and start thinking about all of this at least three years before you are considering retiring. I would say that anywhere from one […]
Read: 2022
Non-Fiction, Reading Now
Younger Next Year is a book I keep coming back to. I forget who first turned me on to it, but I read it in my mid-fifties, and it continues to inspire me. The bottom line is that at some point, sometime in our forties or fifties, our bodies want to get old and decay. […]
Roland Merullo
2008
Read: 2023
Fiction, Reading Now, Spirtuality
OK. I love this book. It’s one of the few books I’ve read where, after I finished it, I immediately began reading it a second time. I’ve written about it in two separate blog posts, and I have many friends who have read it and loved it after I suggested it to them. It’s a […]
Stephen Covey
1989
Read: 2010 or before
Education/Leadership, Non-Fiction, Reading Now, Recommended for Young Adults
This is another one of my bedrock books. Stephen Covey has had such an influence on my personal and professional life. The seven habits: Be Proactive Begin with the End in Mind First Things First Win-Win Seek First to Understand, Then Be Understood Synergize Sharpen the Saw From “Beginning with the End in Mind” which […]
