I wanted to be Tarzan. In my youth, I studied all 24 Tarzan novels that Edgar Rice Burroughs wrote. I practiced the language of the great apes (“mangani”). If I worked at it, I could yodel that Tarzan yell without it dissolving into fits of coughing. Only two things held me back from ...
It takes a tough old coot to leave modern conveniences behind and get out there and rough it. But that’s what I am — an old coot. And reasonably tough. It takes a little spirit of adventure, grit and muscle to do what I did, and I have nothing if I don’t have very little of those. Which ...
“No, no, no!” My tormentor, er, teacher seemed a tad irritated. “It’s hold down the command and shift keys together, then, without letting go of them, you press that key, THEN, this key. After that is when you hit the ampersand. It’s so simple.” I felt sorry for the kid. He was ...
How much are thoughts worth now? However much thinking costs these days, it’s apparent that not enough people are willing to pay for it. They’re saving their pennies. Now that the U.S. Mint has stopped producing pennies, it’s only a matter of time before we run out of the gazillion ...
Ooooh, they really know how to push my buttons. I wish I could figure out how to push theirs. The stereotype is that older people fumble with technology. Screens freeze us. Robocalls confuse us. If a grandkid with a mean streak tells us we have to do the chicken dance to make our streaming ...
When I was a kid, most moms were tailors by necessity. Not always good ones. But most dads said, “He ripped it. He can wear it.” Moms sighed, rummaged through their sewing boxes and went to work tailoring. I think the patches craze of the 1960s was started by a mom who didn’t have ...
